“There’s nothing better than living in friendship,” Chinese leader Xi Jinping quoted medieval poet Alisher Navoi to his Uzbek counterpart, Shavkat Mirziyoyev, upon meeting him at the Samarkand airport last week. Shortly after, Russian President Vladimir Putin’s jet landed.

Both leaders were scheduled to meet for the first time since February to attend this year’s Shanghai Cooperation Organization (SCO) summit in Uzbekistan, together with five more member nations to convene and welcome Iran, which recently attained full membership in the Eurasian body. SCO is a regional security group formed by Beijing and Moscow in the early 2000s to counterbalance the influence wielded by the United States.

Putin and Xi had discussed matters on the sidelines during the summit. Nevertheless, many have anticipated their meeting, especially following the Russian invasion of Ukraine, to see if the dynamic between the authoritarian leaders has shifted. Three weeks before the attack, both leaders declared a “without limits” type of partnership, but as the war continues 200 days later and the odds of winning aren’t on Russia’s side, many wonders if the expression still applies.

Stability Over Friendship

For the past months, Russia’s invasion of Ukraine and China’s relentless military harassment of Taiwan had placed both countries on the sour side of the US and its European allies. But unlike Russia, China appears to be treading its thin ice carefully. Why? Simply because they don’t want to be barred like Russia in terms of economic activities. Remember, China is obsessed with social stability. Expressing full-blast support for the former’s raging expansion can potentially trigger instability, harm its trading route in the Western countries, and lose its valuable customers and export resources.