Energy Was Key In Putin-Xi Meeting

China stated two weeks before Russia invaded Ukraine that “there is ‘no limit’ to how far Russian and Chinese friendship may go” and signed a slew of huge oil and gas deals shortly afterward that provided an additional layer of insulation to both from any U.S. sanctions in the future. However, signaling perhaps that Beijing did not believe that Russia would necessarily launch a full-scale invasion of Ukraine before it did so, only a day after the military conflict spread to Ukraine’s major cities, Chinese…