China has restricted the export of mid-tier precision machine tools to Russia, industry insiders say, in an apparent success for U.S. secondary sanctions aimed at weakening Moscow’s war effort in Ukraine. Chinese trade with Russia—particularly oil and gas—has helped buoy Russia's sanctioned-strapped economy since Moscow launched its full-scale invasion of Ukraine in February 2022.
Yet, many Chinese firms have shown they are not immune to Western pressure designed to erode Russia’s war-fighting capacity. Russian importers have reported growing difficulty making transactions with Chinese banks since last year, and exports of dual civilian-military goods to China's neighbor have also increasingly encountered hangups.
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