Xi Jinping arrived in Moscow on Wednesday for the start of a four-day visit during which he will attend Russia’s military parade commemorating the anniversary of the end of the second world war, known in Russia as Victory Day.
The Chinese leader’s trip has coincided with mass Ukrainian drone attacks on the Russian capital. Moscow’s mayor, Sergei Sobyanin, said Russia’s air defence units destroyed at least 19 Ukrainian drones overnight.
Xi was greeted on arrival in Moscow with a military band.
The attacks forced most of Moscow’s airports to close and Russia’s national carrier, Aeroflot, said it was reordering timetables to cope with the disruption.
The wave of drones launched by Kyiv to disrupt the Kremlin’s preparations for Victory Day forced at least one world leader to divert his Moscow flight on Wednesday, with the Serbian president’s plane rerouted to Baku, Azerbaijan before the jet eventually landed in the Russian capital.
Aleksandar Vučić’s visit to Moscow, for which he has been heavily criticised by several European countries, had already run into complications when Latvia and Lithuania reportedly barred his plane from their airspace, forcing a detour.
Russia’s defence ministry said its military had shot down more than 500 drones in the previous 24 hours, while airport closures affected at least 60,000 passengers.
Xi’s visit, which comes as China is engaged in a trade war with the US and soon after Ukraine accused China of directly aiding Russia’s invasion, underscores his close relationship with Vladimir Putin. It is Xi’s 11th visit to Russia since becoming president. He has paid more visits there than to any other country.
The Russian foreign ministry described the trip as “one of the central events in Russian-Chinese relations this year”. Xi is expected to sign numerous cooperation agreements, deepening the “no limits” relationship between China and Russia. There will also be discussion of the planned Power of Siberia 2 gas pipeline, which could carry 50bn cubic metres of gas a year from Russia to China.
Xi is expected to hold talks with Putin on Thursday and to attend the Victory Day parade on Friday. China’s People’s Liberation Army will send an honour guard to participate in the ceremony in Moscow for the first time since 2015, and for the first time ever will send an honour guard to join in parallel celebrations in Minsk, the capital of Belarus.
In an article published on Wednesday, Xi wrote: “China and Russia are both major countries with significant influence and are constructive forces in maintaining global strategic stability and improving global governance … Together we must foil all schemes to disrupt or undermine our bonds of amity and trust.”
Bilateral trade between China and Russia has reached record levels since Russia’s invasion of Ukraine in 2022, providing Moscow with an economic lifeline at a time when western countries have imposed sanctions on it. Trade reached $245bn (£183bn) in 2024, 66% more than in 2021.
China maintains it is a neutral party in the war and that it supports a peaceful resolution to the conflict. But in recent months Kyiv has been increasingly outspoken about what it says is China’s direct aid for Moscow’s war efforts.
Two Chinese mercenaries, out of hundreds who have travelled to fight with the Russian army, were caught in the eastern Donetsk region last month. They did not have a direct link to the Chinese state but recruitment videos are easily found on China’s tightly controlled social media.
Volodymyr Zelenskyy has accused China of closing its eyes to the participation of its nationals in the war.
Zelenskyy has criticised foreign leaders for travelling to Moscow, saying that Ukraine “cannot bear responsibility for what happens” to any heads of state attending the Victory Day parade.
Moscow has said 29 world leaders are expected to attend the Victory Day commemorations, marking the largest foreign delegation at the Red Square parade since Putin launched his full-scale invasion more than three years ago.
Apart from Xi, other notable guests include the Brazilian president, Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva and the pro-Russian prime minister of Slovakia, Robert Fico.
