Matviyenko conveyed a message from Putin to Xi Jinping

On July 10, Speaker of the Federation Council Valentina Matviyenko met with Chinese President Xi Jinping in Beijing. She flew to the capital of China at the head of the Russian delegation, which will take part in the work of the Russian-Chinese inter-parliamentary commission on cooperation. How reported On the website of the upper house of the Russian parliament, Matviyenko gave Xi an oral message from Russian President Vladimir Putin. According to her, the Russian leader warmly recalls the March visit of the Chinese leader to Moscow and lengthy negotiations with him.

The speaker of the Federation Council believes that the strategic partnership between the two countries has already reached the highest level in history, and in Russia there is an “absolute consensus” on the development of relations with China. The main purpose of her visit to Beijing Matviyenko called holding the eighth meeting of the inter-parliamentary commission on cooperation between the Federal Assembly and the National People’s Congress (NPC). According to her, the parliamentarians plan to more actively “exchange experience in legislative activity” taking into account new challenges and threats. Another task she called the need to increase regional cooperation between the two countries.

Xinhua reported that Xi supported the practice of exchanging experience with Russia in the field of lawmaking and public administration. He added that Moscow and Beijing also need to work together more actively in multilateral formats such as the Shanghai Cooperation Organization (SCO) and BRICS, promote global governance reform and protect the interests of emerging market and developing countries.

Later, Matviyenko told reporters that Russia, represented by China, can count on “a firm, reliable, friendly shoulder.” “Neither China nor Russia will allow anyone to speak to them in the language of force, threats. We stand together for equal cooperation. We stand together for preventing interference in internal affairs,” she said.

In addition, the countries can ahead of schedule, already in 2023, overcome the bar in terms of mutual trade turnover of $200 billion (the leaders of the states set such a goal for 2024). Matvienko added that now more than 70% of mutual settlements between Russia and China take place in national currencies.

Prior to this, Matvienko met Zhao Leji, Chairman of the Standing Committee (PC) of the NPC, who received this post in March 2023. From his point of view, relations between Beijing and Moscow were able to withstand the test of “a volatile global environment.”

Matvienko’s visit to China will last until July 12. It is known that several vice-speakers and heads of committees of both chambers of the Russian parliament will also participate in the inter-parliamentary meeting.

Prior to that, in 2023, personal negotiations were already held by the leaders of the states – in March, Xi came to Moscow, and the prime ministers – in May, Russian Prime Minister Mikhail Mishustin visited Shanghai and Beijing and held talks with Li Qiang.

Matvienko’s visit is one of the signs of stable and progressive relations between Russia and China, says Andrey Karneev, head of the HSE School of Oriental Studies. According to him, such events are the “third level” of top government contacts – after meetings directly between Xi and Putin, as well as visits by prime ministers. Such visits serve as an addition to government work at other levels, and parliamentary cooperation between the two countries is developing noticeably, the expert notes.

Matvienko’s trip to China is very timely, says Alexander Lomanov, head of the Center for Asia-Pacific Studies at IMEMO RAS. Given the recently ended pandemic, the opportunity to re-enforce the relationship was clearly not superfluous. Of particular importance is the fact that Matviyenko’s Chinese counterpart, chairman of the Standing Committee of the All-Union People’s Party Zhao Leji, has been in office relatively recently and had no experience in parliamentary activities, dealing with corruption. So the possibility of meeting him, the expert adds, will definitely be a positive thing. In addition, recent events in Russia related to the actions of PMC Wagner caused a great resonance in China. In China, there were serious discussions about how what happened will affect relations with Russia. As a result, Lomanov notes, now it would be very timely to tell the Chinese colleagues what is happening in Russia, to calm the information confusion. This, the expert concludes, is exactly what Matvienko will do in China.