Russian President Vladimir Putin recently surprised Beijing with a proposal for a trilateral side-summit involving U.S. President Donald Trump during the November 18-19 APEC meeting in Shenzhen, China. This initiative has left Chinese President Xi Jinping in a precarious position; declining the invitation could reflect poorly on his role as host, yet accepting it forces him to navigate a difficult agenda that aligns poorly with Beijing's preferences.
The objectives of the three leaders remain significantly misaligned. President Trump has expressed interest in discussing nuclear arms control, a topic Beijing prefers to avoid due to the substantial disparity between China's nuclear arsenal and the stockpiles held by the United States and Russia. Meanwhile, President Putin is eager to discuss the war in Ukraine to push for a resolution, a subject Xi is hesitant to engage with for fear of appearing to participate in the division of Ukrainian territory without the involvement of Kyiv or European representatives. While Xi prefers a limited and controlled meeting, Trump favors a more flexible format centered on nuclear arms control.
Despite media speculation comparing the proposal to a 21st-century Yalta Conference, observers suggest Putin’s vision is more akin to the Russia-India-China trilateral framework. Established in 1998, that format allows Moscow to play a pivotal role, though it has failed to resolve long-standing Sino-Indian tensions. Russian political figures, such as consultant Alexei Mukhin and Press Secretary Dmitry Peskov, have framed the potential meeting as a way for Russia to act as a bridge between Washington and Beijing to reset global security architecture.
Perspectives within China are divided on the value of such a summit. On the optimistic side, Wang Wen, a dean and professor at the Chongyang Institute for Financial Studies at Renmin University of China, hopes that the trilateral would support U.N. efforts to create a multipolar order and “inject certainty in a multipolar world.” Other experts are more cautious. Zhou Bo, a retired People’s Liberation Army (PLA) officer who made a sensation overseas for his candid publications about Russia’s war in Ukraine, contended that a trilateral format might at best achieve a mechanism for mutual notification of missile launches. For his part, Zhu Feng, a prominent scholar and dean at Nanjing University, dismissed trilateral talks as a distraction from the main event, which in his view should be for China and the United States to find a way to control their areas of disagreement. Other Chinese experts cautioned about the misaligned goals of the three leaders but expressed hope that China would gain by showing that its involvement contributed to global stability. Ultimately, while Chinese officials typically prefer bilateral diplomacy to maintain control, the pressure from a strategic partner like Russia has created a scenario where the outcome, if it proceeds, may prioritize optics over substance, adhering to the Chinese sentiment that “the guest should follow the host’s wishes.”
An AI-generated image based on a White House photo of the Trump-Putin summit in 2025.
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