China visits Saudi Arabia, signs oil partnership deal

This week, Chinese President Xi Jinping is making his first trip to Saudi Arabia in almost seven years. While there, he signed a comprehensive strategic partnership with the region's largest oil exporter and met with other Middle Eastern leaders.

At a time when US-Saudi relations have deteriorated due to OPEC's decision to reduce crude oil supplies, the visit is evidence that China and the Gulf area are strengthening their commercial connections. The mission was to advance China's ties with the Arab world, as Xi stated in an essay that appeared in Saudi media.

According to the official Saudi Press Agency, the partnership agreement between the two parties also contains a number of agreements and memoranda of understanding, including ones on hydrogen energy and improving coordination between the kingdom's Vision 2030 and China's Belt and Road Initiative (SPA). It didn't give any specifics.

The largest trading partner and source of increasing investment for Saudi Arabia is China. It is also the largest oil consumer in the world. Saudi Arabia is the top crude oil supplier in the world and China's biggest trading partner in the Middle East.

"Energy cooperation will be at the centre of all discussions between the Saudi-Chinese leadership," said Ayham Kamel, head of Eurasia Group's Middle East and North Africa research team. "There is great recognition of the need to build a framework to ensure that this interdependence is accommodated politically, especially given the scope of energy transition in the West."

Across the ensuing decades, governments all over the world have vowed to significantly reduce carbon emissions. Germany and Canada, for example, have increased their investments in renewable energy to hasten their transition to net-zero economies.

Since the 2000s, the US has greatly boosted domestic oil and gas production while quickening the switch to sustainable energy.

All nations are rushing to secure their energy sources as a result of the Russian invasion of Ukraine in February. The West has also further destabilized the oil markets by imposing an embargo and a price ceiling on the second-largest petroleum exporter in the world.

Energy security has also risen in importance for China, which is dealing with its own serious problems.

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