Locals stay wary as China cosies up to old enemy from over the river

With tears in his eyes, Peter Xiong gestures wildly at the dark diorama behind him. It shows hundreds of people being driven off a cliff as houses burn in the background. Scattered along the road are dead children. Dramatic music, flashing lights and the sound effects of screams all add to the effect. “Look! That’s what Russia does!” he said.

Mr Xiong is a tourist at Heihe’s Aihui history museum, a memorial to the violence once visited on this remote northern Chinese community by the Cossacks in the 17th century as the tsars pushed to expand imperial Russia’s borders. But for him this is not just about the past.

Amid signs that Beijing is considering providing military assistance to Moscow in Ukraine, the relationship between the neighbours – and their views on conflict – has been thrown into the spotlight.

In this snowy outpost of China, where the Russian flag flutters on the other side of the frozen-over Amur River, people know what Russia’s army is capable of, given the chance.

“I’m against any invasion,” Mr Xiong added, when asked about the parallels between the 17th century atrocities and those taking place in Ukraine. “History keeps repeating itself.”

This week has seen a flurry of diplomacy as the West seeks to head off the possibility that China may help arm Russia in its fight to take over Ukraine. Such a shift could be gamechanging for the war as both sides struggle for the ammo to keep fighting.

Last month, German magazine Der Spiegel reported that Xi’an Bingo Intelligent Aviation Technology, a Chinese firm, was considering selling Moscow 100 attack drones. Shortly afterwards, The Washington Post cited American officials as saying that Beijing was contemplating sending Russia much-needed shells.

China has denied everything, pointing to a 12-point peace plan – derided as toothless by the West – it recently released to prove that it seeks to be a mediator, not to take sides. Yet relations with Moscow are clearly getting cosier.

Chinese leader Xi Jinping is believed to be planning to visit Russia this year and last week foreign minister Wang Yi became the highest-level official to visit Russia since the start of the war.

After meeting Mr Wang, Russian president Vladimir Putin said the partnership had reached “new frontiers”.

“Russian-Chinese relations are developing as we planned in previous years. Everything is moving forward and developing,” he added.

Meanwhile the sanctions imposed on Russia by the West have partially been compensated by China. Trade between the countries went up 30 per cent last year, including sanctioned technology such as high-end chips in exchange for oil and gas.

Yet on the ground in Heihe, perched on the edge of the northern province of Heilongjiang, things are less clear.

The border crossing here has been closed since the outbreak of Covid, with barbed wire cordoning off the river’s quays, and warehouses with Russian writing on lying abandoned.

Even for Russians who could find their way across, they would not be allowed in the Aihui museum.

“Their visit would hurt our feelings,” explained an employee at the ticket office. Another said she was sure there was a similar museum on the other side of the border. “They see everything that has happened very differently than we do.”

Yet direct confrontation is avoided. In normal times, Chinese people here do business with Russians daily. Matryoshka nesting dolls, fur hats and vodka are for sale in almost every store and most here do not want to see further sanctions against the country.

“Russians are already very poor. In these difficult times we must support each other,” said a local taxi driver.

Their opinion of Russia and its invasion of Ukraine is complicated by their view of another major global player: China’s old arch-enemy, the US.

Locals have been fed a story by Beijing that Moscow was forced into the conflict because Nato, led by Washington, threatened its borders.

“The US supports Ukraine, so we have to support Russia,” said the museum’s janitor.

But not everyone is convinced. “We always say the Americans are bad people, but we never had a conflict with them,” said the taxi driver. “We have had conflicts with Russia though. So no, I don’t trust them.”

‘Russians are already very poor. In these difficult times we must support each other’