China Cornered in Iran-Israel War, Xi May Lean on Putin as Russia Gains Strategic Edge

Beijing: When the US bombed Iran's nuclear plants on Saturday, China openly protested. It expressed its support for Iran and criticized the US. However, experts say that its support is likely to decrease due to its limited role as a mediator in the Middle East and the damage caused by Iran's threats to block the Strait of Hormuz. However, Russia is expected to benefit more from this conflict than China. This is the reason why Russia has kept itself aside by issuing only a few statements after the attack on Iran, even though Iran is its big ally.

China is worried about oil and gas

According to the report of Oil Price.com, China is worried about the supply of oil and gas due to the Iran-Israel war. China buys huge quantities of oil and gas from Iran despite the threats of US sanctions. But, now the blockade of the Strait of Hormuz and the instability of Iran are likely to have a negative impact on this supply. Due to this, China has once again started showing more interest in Russia's Power of Siberia 2 pipeline. This is a proposed project of Russia, on which China had not shown any hurry earlier.

China showing interest in Russia's project

The Wall Street Journal, citing unnamed sources close to Beijing, has said that China is now taking interest in this project of Russia. China had earlier not agreed with Russia's proposals regarding the ownership and pricing of Power of Siberia 2. Apart from this, it did not want to be overly dependent on a single source of oil and gas. For this reason, it was considering increasing the purchase of oil and gas from a country like Iran other than Russia.

Where does China buy oil and gas from

The WSJ, citing data from Rystad Energy, said that about a third of China's gas imports come as LNG from Qatar and the United Arab Emirates. Russia is China's third-largest LNG supplier after Australia and Qatar. But, according to S&P Global, Russia is also China's largest pipeline supplier, through Siberia 1, whose throughput is set to reach 38 billion cubic meters this year.