China's foreign minister explained the purchase of gas from Russia by the interests of his people

China buys gas from Russia in order to meet the needs of the Chinese people. This was stated by Chinese Foreign Minister Wang Yi at the Munich Security Conference on February 14.

"I would like to ask a question: if China will not buy gas from Russia, what country will be able to provide us with so much gas? We are meeting the needs of the Chinese people," he said.

Wang Yi added that he does not consider sanctions an effective way to resolve problems - disagreements should be solved through political dialog. This also applies to the conflict in Ukraine, the Chinese Foreign Minister emphasized. At the same time, he added that China would strongly respond to unilateral "intimidating" practices in its attitude.

The minister also said that Beijing was ready to "play to the end" in case of attempts to exert pressure from Washington. At the same time, Wang Yi expressed hope that China and the United States will still manage to find a common vector of development.

Crossing views: Putin and Xi discuss the situation around Ukraine

As well as the prospects for building relations with the U.S. given Trump's rise to power

On January 21, Russian President Vladimir Putin said during talks with Chinese leader Xi Jinping that Russia ranks first in natural gas and oil supplies to China. China is the largest consumer of Russian energy resources.

Earlier, on January 20, it became known that in 2024 China increased imports of Russian oil by 1.3% to 108.47 million tons. The volume of Russian LNG supplies also increased by 3.3% over this period, to 8.3 million tons.