♪♪ >> Hello and welcome to "GZERO World."

I'm Ian Bremmer, and today, where China fits into the Russia-Ukraine war.

President Xi Jinping has cast his lot with the Russian president, but he does want to avoid a new Cold War with the West.

Can he pull it off?

Today, I'm joined by Newsweek's Beijing bureau chief Melinda Liu.

She spent over 30 years reporting from inside China.

Then horrors in a Kyiv suburb have the world clamoring again for investigations into Russian war crimes.

And of course, I've also got your "Puppet Regime."

>> Hey, MBS, It's good to see ya.

>> Oh, my God, I'm so happy to see you guys, too.

It's been forever.

>> But first a word from the folks who help us keep the lights on.

>> Major corporate funding provided by founding sponsor First Republic.

At First Republic, our clients come first.

Taking the time to listen helps us provide customized banking and wealth-management solutions.

More on our clients at firstrepublic.com.

Additional funding provided by... ...and by... >> CIA Director Bill Burns understands autocrats on a personal level.

When I interviewed him back in 2020, he called Vladimir Putin, who he met while serving as U.S. ambassador to Russia, an "apostle of payback."

>> Putin today is a combustible combination of grievance and ambition and insecurity all wrapped together.

>> That combo exploded when Putin invaded Ukraine in February under the false pretext of wanting to de-Nazify the country.

Yeah, they actually said that.

So last month, when Director Burns spoke before Congress about the internal thinking of another autocrat, Chinese President Xi Jinping, I listened.

>> I think President Xi and the Chinese leadership are a little bit unsettled by what they're seeing in Ukraine.

They did not anticipate the significant difficulties the Russians were going to run into.

>> Xi is clearly still deciding how to align his friendship without limits with Russia alongside a stable future with the West.

And it's not going to be easy.

In a March phone call, President Biden listed out the consequences that China would face if it supports Russia's invasion of Ukraine.

When China's ambassador to the United States appeared on "Face the Nation" later that month, he looked visibly pained in trying to condemn war in general without in any way condemning Russia.

>> Why can't you condemn this as an invasion?

>> Well, let's don't be naive.

Condemnation... >> It sounds naive to say that's not an invasion.

>> ...doesn't solve the problem.

I would be surprised if Russia will back down by condemnation.

>> How successfully will China manage this crisis?

Judging by Chinese state media, they've clearly thrown in their lot with Moscow.

Chinese journalists are actually embedding with Russian troops in Ukraine.

It reminds you of CNN and Fox during the Iraq war.

Chinese universities now have classes to provide a "correct understanding" of the war, with an emphasis on Russia's grievances with the West and government newspapers have blamed the United States for the conflict in Ukraine.

But there are still plenty of reasons why Beijing wants to be careful about cozying up too closely with a country about as popular on the world stage right now as North Korea, or, dare I say, Will Smith.

Internally, China is dealing with its slowest economic growth rates in three decades, made worse by knock-on challenges from their costly zero-COVID policy and ineffective vaccines.

And Xi also knows that Russia isn't much of a commercial trading partner, not least compared to the West.

In 2021, China's trade with Russia topped out at $147 billion.

Compare that with $756 billion with the U.S. and $828 billion with the European Union.

That's what we call capitalism with socialist characteristics.

And yet there remain geopolitical flashpoints between the United States and China that even the starkest economic calculus may not deter.

Burns, for instance, doesn't think Xi Jinping has taken his eyes off a little island 100 miles east of China's coast.

>> Well, Congressman, I would just say analytically, I would not underestimate President Xi and the Chinese leadership's determination with regard to Taiwan.

>> I'm skeptical about the prospects of invasion near term, but whether Xi Jinping will ultimately go so far as to launch his own Ukraine-style war into Taiwan, given Putin's recent failures, does remain a serious concern.

That's just one of the many things I'm talking about today with Newsweek's Beijing bureau chief Melinda Liu.

Here's our conversation.

Melinda Liu, thank you so much for joining us on "GZERO."

>> Thank you.

Good to be here.

>> So how would you describe Xi Jinping's relationship with Putin right now?

>> These are two people who have been thrown together in a marriage of convenience.

They've known each other a long time.

So it's not entirely awkward, but it's not entirely comfortable either.

There's not a lot of trust between these two people, and they -- each of them probably know that down the road a number of years from now, the tables will be turned and one of them will be allied with America against the other.

It's always been like that and it always will be like that.

That's how they see it.

China did not expect its best friend, Vladimir Putin, to stumble in Ukraine.

They may not have known it was going to be a full-bore invasion.

And I think many people suspect that they just thought it would be another replay of 2014.

>> They claim.

They claim they weren't told.

Publicly, they claim they did not know.

>> They claim that.

I think the way we have to look at this is that, you know, this whole -- the dynamic, it's "The Romance of the Three Kingdoms," which is an ancient Chinese historical novel about three kingdoms that are constantly circling each other, vying with each other, allying and falling out and, you know, allying with the other.

It's a love triangle in geopolitics.

It's almost "The Romance of the Three Kingdoms" meets "The Godfather," you know, so the analogy of Putin and Xi Jinping was that it's like two Mafia dons.

They meet and they're sort of -- They're on good terms because their clans are on good terms.

And one of them says so-and-so is a problem there in Europe and "we're going to take care of it."

Now, it's not like he says, "I'm going to assassinate the guy."

He just says, "We're going to take care of it.

And then Xi Jinping says, "Well, don't do it during the Olympics," because, of course, that happened once.

The Russian attack on Georgia happened right at the beginning of the 2008 Summer Olympics.

And, you know, probably that was Xi Jinping's biggest concern, like, "Oh, my God, you can't ruin my Olympics."

And probably Putin reassured him somehow that that was not going to happen.

>> I do want to ask -- I have to say I've been annoyed by just how many questions I get about the likelihood that now China's going to go into Taiwan, guns blazing.

That's clearly not the case.

What lessons do you actually see the Chinese government having taken away from Ukraine in terms of how they think about Taiwan going forward?

>> I think it's been a sobering experience for Beijing.

You've got to understand that this is a leadership where, you know, obviously their rhetoric can be kind of belligerent and they play a lot of games in the South China Sea and in the air above China's islands and things like that.

But this is a country that hasn't had a real war, you know, since the '70s, literally since a border incursion with Vietnam where you had runners bringing orders to tank commanders because they didn't have modern communications.

And I think what really made them kind of pull up would have been the incredible bravery of the Ukrainian people, the willing to do whatever they could, make a Molotov cocktail, you know, train with a rifle cut out of a piece of cardboard or something.

That's something that they would not have expected.

And then most importantly, the way that the allies were rallied.

>> Rallied, yeah.

>> NATO has not been so energized in a long, long time.

And I think everyone was surprised.

But I think China especially would look at that and see them, you know, see it mirrored in their close -- you know, their nearer environment in the Pacific and say, "Whoa, you know, if you translate that, if you take that and place it against the template of Asia, you know, we could have a problem."

And so I think this is all had a very sobering effect.

They were in no rush to invade Taiwan any time soon anyway.

And I think if anything, it's put that timetable back a little bit.

>> So when the Russian foreign minister went to China, the Chinese foreign minister, Wang Yi, praised him for Russia helping to avert a humanitarian disaster on the ground in Ukraine.

Again, the Chinese know how that's going to read in the West, not just in the U.S., but in Europe.

What are they thinking when they make a statement like that well over a month into this devastating war?

>> They have an astounding capability to maintain a state of denial, to say things that are clearly not true.

Their propaganda needs sometimes can spin out of control and they don't know exactly how to play it.

Like, for example, the Chinese state-run broadcaster CGTN, which is English language, they broadcast overseas as well as within China.

And they're actually kind of interesting because they've been trying to show some of what's going on in Ukraine just these past few days when everyone is focused on the absolute horrific evidence of civilian deaths, torture, executions as Russian troops withdraw from some areas of Ukraine.

A lot of the CGTN coverage has been on the Russians who have died and left behind, you know, devastated tank convoys and things as they've pulled back, including Russian bodies of Russian soldiers and whatnot.

But the problem with that is okay, yes, I mean, it's bad when people die and you have to feel some sympathy, of course, for the victims, regardless of nationality -- they're all human beings.

But then, you know, if you focus too much on the losses of the Russians, then what happens when you have to turn around and say, "Oh, Russia has achieved its goals," you know, but, you know, if Moscow wants to say, "Okay, we're declaring victory and we're going home now," China will say that, too, without a blink, without any sign that they're just contradicting themselves.

>> You've been focusing on the English language, which, again, I mean, I've watched in the U.S., CGTN as well.

But of course, that's not -- that's not remotely as popular as Chinese language media.

And I'm wondering what the Chinese language media coverage has looked like again all the way through this war.

>> China's national broadcaster, CCTV, looking increasingly like Russian state television these days, its anchors parroting the Kremlin, calling the invasion of Ukraine a "special military operation."

>> Is it changing?

Is it starting to reflect more reality on the ground or not at all?

>> I think it has changed a bit, but even early on in the conflict, there was a very strange thing.

People may not know it, but actually the Chinese relationship with Ukraine was pretty close before Russia invaded.

And so there was almost like two channels of communication.

The Chinese ambassador to Ukraine was very friendly to Ukraine.

There are some social media posts of people who are pro-Ukraine, or at least showing some sympathy for Ukraine.

The range of Chinese language media tonalities on this whole conflict is quite wide.

I mean, of course, you do have the out there sort of full wolf warrior mode of media.

But you also have some more thoughtful, I would say, tone, tonalities, even though the general message is still very pro-Russian.

What we have to understand is China's focus right now in media as well as in the halls of power is not necessarily 100% focused on Ukraine.

They've got a big problem with COVID still now.

>> Yes, they do, indeed.

>> They've got the worst -- the worst numbers of COVID infections, including asymptomatic infections, since February 2020.

And that is actually a bigger nightmare for Xi Jinping than what's going on in Ukraine because he has tied his legacy and his reputation on a zero-COVID strategy and it stamped COVID out.

Except it didn't stamp COVID out, and now we've got a really serious uptick in cases.

And something's got to give.

You know, either they've got to revisit the so-called zero-COVID strategy or they're going to have to -- they're going to have to get used to a lot more casualties.

>> Now, the numbers, I mean, of course, from an American perspective, are still tiny.

I mean, you know, the fact is 1 million Americans have died of COVID in the last two years, which is a staggering figure.

If you think about it.

China has for the last two years trumpeted just how successful they have been compared to the U.S., compared to Europe, compared to just about every major Western economy out there.

But now, as you say, that success, coupled with no flexibility in the system, has led to the largest city in China being completely locked down.

I mean, no one on the streets, no one leaving their apartments for a week and counting.

How is that likely to play out?

Are we starting to see any level at all of social dissent as a consequence of that?

Are we starting to see any political figures saying "maybe we should reconsider that" or is that way too -- way too far beyond the pale for a country with as much centralized control as China?

>> Well, first of all, you know, there's not really much social dissent and people taking to the streets because there's actually nobody in the streets.

I mean, the streets are actually physically empty of people right now in Shanghai.

>> Oh, I know that.

>> Yeah.

>> You can have social dissent when you are locked into your apartments, right?

And so I'm just saying, is there any of that going on in China right now?

>> Yeah.

On social media, for example, one of the trending hashtags was it's difficult to buy groceries in Shanghai, and it had 40 million posts on Weibo, the social media platform.

Okay.

It's hardly an incendiary thing.

But I mean, for China's premier city, its most cosmopolitan city, to have people complaining that it's hard to buy food in China, it's because they're locked down and the people who normally deliver food are also locked down.

And people are just not ready for this sort of a challenge.

And, you know, and people have had two years of it.

So that means that it's been two years of a pretty bad economy for a lot of people.

Certainly the gig economy and a lot of, you know, sort of retail -- restaurants and things -- have been hurting.

So I think there is definitely a level of discontent or a vocalization of discontent that we hadn't -- that we would not be hearing if we didn't have a serious lockdown in Shanghai.

It's quite symbolic that it's Shanghai because Shanghai was always thought to be the best managed, the most advanced, the most sophisticated.

Well, we'll put it this way.

The people of Shanghai always thought that they were those things.

And so when they see themselves challenged, facing a challenge and scrambling in a way that they never thought they would have to, that hits right to the soul.

Two years ago, everyone was talking about something called common prosperity.

>> Common prosperity, yeah.

>> Exactly, it was something that Xi Jinping coined.

And it was supposed to explain, you know, a new economic approach.

It was supposed to address the very disturbing rich/poor gap in China.

And it was supposed to sort of cut the tycoons and the billionaires down to size and -- >> Yeah, it was basically make China great again.

I mean, it was like his -- it was his buzz phrase running it.

Absolutely.

>> Right.

Right.

Well, there's not a lot of it being talked about now.

And then you got to ask why.

>> Yeah.

>> I think this is a year of unpredictability for China.

It already has started that way.

But even before the invasion of Ukraine, we kind of knew it was going to be a tricky year because in the fall, there's going to be a very important Party Congress and Xi Jinping is widely expected still to push through a highly unusual third term for himself, which basically opens the door for him to be leader for life.

>> Be president for life, yeah.

>> Sort of like Mao Zedong was.

You know, sometimes I wonder, you know, when Xi Jinping looks around and he looks at Putin, does it seem like he's looking in a mirror?

You know, here are these two autocrats.

They've been very isolated.

Xi Jinping hasn't left China since the beginning of the pandemic.

Obviously, you know, we saw it from the dynamics of Putin meeting with his generals and things.

He's surrounded by yes-men.

We have to assume the same is true of Xi Jinping.

Where are they getting their information?

You know, where is anyone getting their information?

I think it's a -- It's a pretty unsettled situation here.

I'm not predicting anything because I just can't -- I just don't see enough.

I think anyone who thinks that they can predict what's going on in China now are precisely those who don't know.

>> I've encountered many of those people.

So, Melinda, it's really nice to talk with you.

Thank you so much for joining us on "GZERO World."

>> Thank you, Ian, my pleasure.

♪♪ >> A warning to sensitive viewers that the next few minutes will be difficult to watch.

As Ukrainian forces re-entered the Kyiv suburb of Bucha earlier this month following a Russian retreat of forces, they reported finding hundreds of civilian bodies lying in streets or in hastily dug mass graves.

Images show some of the victims with their hands still tied behind their backs.

>> Iryna Kostenko wanted to talk about the 10th of March, the day the Russians killed her only son, Oleksei.

>> Across Kyiv's outskirts, survivors tell similar stories like that of an elderly mother whose daughter, Tatyana Mazanko, was shot dead at her front door while watching a column of Russian tanks roll up her street in the early days of the war.

>> Interpreter: The massacre in our city of Bucha is only one.

Unfortunately, only one of many examples of what the occupiers have been doing on our land for the past 41 days.

>> The Bucha killings follow earlier reports that Russian forces have been targeting Ukrainian civilians, including a maternity hospital in Mariupol and a theater in the same city that had the Russian word for children, "deti," clearly marked next to it in huge letters.

The Russians, for their part, have accused the Ukrainians of violating the rules of war, too.

On March 16th, a White House reporter asked President Biden if he was ready to call Vladimir Putin a war criminal.

And Biden's answer was clear.

>> The White House tried to temper Biden's remarks, but it begs the question what makes a war crime a war crime?

Something we should know.

According to the United Nations, a war crime is a serious breach of international law committed against civilians or enemy combatants.

Unlike a genocide or crimes against humanity, war crimes can only occur within the context of armed conflict.

The term itself has ancient origins.

The Chinese philosopher Sun Tzu wrote in "The Art of War," "treat the captives well and care for them."

But it wasn't until the 19th and 20th centuries that a modern definition took hold.

The first Geneva Convention of 1864 defined the basis on which rest the rules of international law for the protection of the victims of armed conflicts.

In 1946, the world watched newsreel footage of Nuremberg trials that sent elite Nazi officers to the gallows.

>> The International Military Tribunal sentences you to death by hanging.

>> The 1949 Geneva Convention further codified the rules of war.

Modern efforts to prosecute war criminals led to the 2002 establishment of the International Criminal Court, or ICC, in The Hague, as well as various U.N.-led courts like the International Criminal Tribunal for the former Yugoslavia.

Such international bodies have tried the likes of former Yugoslav leader Slobodan Milosevic and former Liberian leader Charles Taylor.

Some on the dock have tried to escape justice on their own terms.

Bosnian Croat Slobodan Praljak died hours after drinking poison during his U.N. war crimes trial.

>> Stop, please.

Please sit down.

>> Stunned silence ensuing at the U.N. War Crimes Tribunal in The Hague on Wednesday.

>> But here's the thing about international criminal courts.

Not everyone is on board.

The United States, Russia and China, all three, aren't members of the ICC.

President Clinton did sign a treaty to join the court in 2000, but Congress refused to ratify it.

And then the George W. Bush administration justified America's absence from the court by saying that the ICC could bring politically motivated cases against the United States.

Why that would be a uniquely American problem and not, say, also apply to Germany or Japan, both themselves ICC members, is not clear, but it does make it harder for the White House to accuse Moscow of war crimes in Ukraine when it refuses to join the global court where a trial could take place.

♪♪ Today on "Puppet Regime," rising gas prices have Biden and Boris visiting an old friend.

>> As the war in Ukraine drives up energy prices, Western leaders have appealed to major exporters for help.

>> Hey, MBS, it's good to see ya.

>> Oh, my God, I'm so happy to see you guys, too.

It's been forever.

>> Look, we've got to bring oil prices down, and only our friends can help us do that.

>> That's right.

We can't deal with Vladimir Putin anymore.

>> No, sirree, Joe, not after what he's done.

>> It's beyond the pale.

>> Launching an unprovoked war on his neighbors like that.

>> Ah, I know, right?

>> Causing a massive humanitarian crisis.

>> Sheesh, who would do such a thing?

>> Trying to kill dissidents.

>> Trying?

[ Laughs ] Sorry, sorry, go on, go on, go on.

>> If Vladimir Putin thinks we're just going to ignore all that and carry on with business as usual... >> He'd have to be.

>> He'd have to be... >> Just have to be... >> ♪ Meeeeee ♪ >> "Puppet Regime"!

>> That's our show this week.

Come back next week.

And if you like what you see, check us out at gzeromedia.com.

♪♪ ♪♪ ♪♪ ♪♪ >> Major corporate funding provided by founding sponsor First Republic.

At First Republic, our clients come first.

Taking the time to listen helps us provide customized banking and wealth-management solutions.

More on our clients at firstrepublic.com.

Additional funding provided by... ...and by...