Prioritizing Turkey and China in the Russian Trade Policy After Sanctions

The introduction of economic sanctions by western countries against Russia has stimulated the process of reorienting Russian trade and economic ties toward neutral partners, particularly Turkey and China. This study evaluates the extent to which Russian-Turkish cooperation is becoming a more significant factor in neutralizing the impact of sanctions on the Russian economy and compares the relative importance of Turkey and China as trade and economic partners for Russia during the sanction period. The article explores the comparative potential of Russian-Turkish and Russian-Chinese cooperation. China and Turkey play the role of Russia's key partners in overcoming the negative consequences of sanctions. The authors conclude that at the beginning of the period of applying tough sanctions in 2022-23, Turkey's role in Russia's foreign economic relations grew at a faster pace than China's role in a number of areas of economic cooperation. This was confirmed by faster growth rates of trade turnover, and more active cooperation in the field of energy and tourism. and Turkey's access to direct investment volumes comparable to China's. Despite this, China continues to be the most significant country in the external contour of economic relations for Russia. In addition, the West's pressure on China under the trade sanctions policy during 2023-24 was felt to a lesser extent than against Turkey. This led to the fact that by the end of 2023, the growth rate of China's trade with Russia again began to outpace the corresponding growth rate of Russia's trade with Turkey. In general, the built anti-sanctions structure of foreign relations, in which trade with these countries plays a much larger role than investment, can be characterized as relatively fragile, since the likelihood of curtailing ties under pressure from Western countries remains high, which is partially confirmed by the change in the dynamics of Russia's trade turnover with Turkey in 2023-24.