In important news for China and Russia, the two just signed a deal whereby China will by Russian natural gas worth about $400 billion. President Vladimir Putin was in China for two deals negotiating the deal and participating in an Asian security conference.
This deal allows Russia to diversity its market for gas, which until now has gone mostly to Europe. As Keun-Wook Paik, a senior research fellow at the Oxford Institute for Energy Studies said the agreement “opened the door for Russia to enter into Asia’s gas market.”
Paik continued, “Russia, and Putin, can demonstrate it’s not completely isolated because of the Ukraine crisis. Russia has demonstrated that they have a very reliable strategic partnership with China.”
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