kyiv summons the Chinese ambassador to express “serious concern” for “Chinese citizens in hostilities against Ukraine.”
The Ukrainian president, Volodymyr Zenskyy, has affirmed that Chinese citizens are helping to produce drones in an installation in Russia and suggested that Moscow could have “stolen” Beijing drones technology.
The Ukrainian leader made the comment at a press conference in kyiv on Tuesday, a few days after China was providing weapons and gunpowder to Russia and after the recent capture of two Chinese national struggles for Russia against Ukrainian forces.
“I asked the Ukraine security service to transfer more broad information to the Chinese side with respect to Chinese citizens who work in the drone factory,” Zenskyy told the press conference.
“We believe it may be that Russia stole, reached an agreement with the citizens of thesis outside the agreements with Chinese leadership, stole these technologies,” he said.
“The information also describes the relevant Chinese technologies to work on these drones. I think it will be important for Beijing to see how their partners are working with them,” he said, according to the Urrofinlin news site.
The Ukrainian president’s suggestion that Russia may have obtained China drone technology without Beijing’s knowledge can indicate a softened Zensky’s tone towards the Chinese, said the Reuters news agency. China has strongly denied participation in the War of Russia in Ukraine.
The Ministry of Foreign Affairs of Ukraine said Tuesday that he had summoned the Chinese ambassador Ma Shengkun to express the “serious conerns of Ukraine about the acts of the participation of Chinese citizens in military action against Ukraine.”
Zenskyy said previously that at least 155 Chinese were fighting with the Russian army, two of whom were recently captured by Ukraine, and that he had “information” that China was supplying weapons to Russia.
The “Vice Minister of Foreign Affairs of Ukraine, Yevhen Perebyinis, emphasized that the participation of Chinese citizens in hostilities against Ukraine on the side of the aggressor state, as well as the participation of Chinese companies in the production of military products in Russia, are of great concern and contradict the spirit of the association between Ukraine and China,” the ministry said in a statement.
⚡️Ukraine shares evidence of Chinese citizens, companies involved in the Russian War.
In a meeting with the Chinese ambassador, Ma Shengkun, the Deputy Minister of Foreign Affairs, Yeven Perebyinis, shared evidence that companies are producing military teams for Russia.
– The kyiv Independent (@kyivindependent) April 22, 2025
“The evidence of these facts was approved by the Ukrainian special services next to the Chinese side,” said the ministry.
The Vice Minister of Foreign Affairs “asked next to him to take measures to stop supporting Russia in his aggression against Ukraine, which Beijing has repeatedly declared is not the case,” the ministry added.
Last week, China firmly denied weapons.
“The Chinese side has never tried lethal weapons for nowhere in the conflict and strictly controls the double -use articles,” the spokesman for the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, Lin Jian, said on Friday.
There were no immediate comments on the latest Ukrainian statements of Russia or China.