On May 15, 2025, President of China Xi Jinping hosted United States President Donald Trump; four days later, he gathered together with Russian President Vladimir Putin. In the following weeks, on June 8-9, 2026, Xi visited Pyongyang and conducted bilateral and inter-delegation level meetings with North Korean Leader Kim Jong-un. Leader diplomacy, which can directly and rapidly alter the international balance of power, has the potential to shape the future of the world when exercised among great powers. Therefore, making a current evaluation of the power balances, positions, and leader visits among China, the US, and Russia will be valuable for anticipating future dynamics.
Over the past five to six years, although Xi addressed reducing regional tensions and enhancing bilateral relations through several letters to the North Korean leader, this recent trip marked his first visit to Pyongyang since 2019. On September 3, 2025, both Russian and North Korean leaders were hosted as guests of honour by Xi at the parade held in Tiananmen Square in Beijing. The analyses conducted during this era frequently highlighted that the alliance among China, Russia, and North Korea had strengthened. The importance Xi attaches to leader diplomacy became even clearer during Trump’s engagements in Beijing. At the summit, while Xi found the opportunity to personally convey his country’s national interests and red lines to Trump, he also aimed to prevent potential crises that might arise in China-US relations.
During the Xi era, the concept of ‘Wolf Warrior Diplomacy’ has also come to the fore in Chinese foreign policy. This concept indicates that Chinese diplomats are pursuing a more active, aggressive, and confrontational diplomacy in order to assert national interests more vigorously, instead of a traditional, conciliatory approach. This diplomacy, which is successfully carried out by Foreign Secretary Wang Yi, has become one of the defining features of Chinese Foreign Policy. In 2022 and 2023, when Wang was dismissed from his post, a stagnant period was experienced in Chinese foreign policy for a while. Upon this, for the sake of safeguarding national interests and to ensure stability in foreign policy, Xi reappointed Wang. Indeed, Wang’s diplomatic style and Xi’s leadership diplomacy have created a high degree of harmony in China’s foreign policy. This tradition played a pivotal role both in managing existing and potential crises threatening China’s national security and in finding solutions, especially from 2022 onward. Prominent examples among these are Nancy Pelosi’s visit to Taiwan in 2022, the Russia-Ukraine War, the continuously increasing inter-Korean tension, Japan’s proactive defense-security policies, the trade wars with the US, and the crises caused or potentially caused by Trump.
Beijing is pursuing a proactive diplomatic approach in order to overcome the multifaceted crises surrounding it. It is made easier to manage these crises thanks to the relations which Xi established through leader diplomacy. For instance, Beijing is aware of the importance of maintaining its close ties with Pyongyang in line with its national interests and restraining it when necessary. A series of factors are influential in the formation of these ties. First, the Korean Peninsula serves as an extension of the Chinese mainland. Consequently, due to both ideological and geographical factors, North Korea’s largest trading partner is China. A mutual defense treaty and cooperation in the military-defense field exist between the two countries. The Western media emphasizes that China acts as a ‘lifeline’ for Pyongyang, which faces comprehensive international sanctions due to its nuclear weapons program.[i] In this context, it alleges that while China does not sell weapons directly to North Korea, it supplies dual-use goods that can be utilized for military purposes.[ii]
China-North Korea relations, which sat on an even firmer ground with Xi’s Pyongyang visit, are turning into a protective shield against Russia’s or the US’s strategies toward the Far East. Indeed, China also desires to predict in advance how and in what direction both Russia and the US will develop their relations with North Korea, and to be able to take measures against it. For example, North Korea’s following in Russia’s footsteps and entering an open escalation/reckoning race with the West appears contrary to China’s national interests. Indeed, Beijing does not want Moscow to drag Pyongyang into the war against the West along with itself. The involvement of North Korean soldiers in the war in Ukraine and the Moscow-Pyongyang cooperation estimated to continue in other military fields increase China’s concerns on this issue.
China also calculates the results that the Trump administration’s potentially developing a constructive dialogue with North Korean Leader Kim Jong-un will lead to. Therefore, getting closer with North Korea reflects China’s purpose of controlling its near environment as well. A similar situation is valid for China’s relations with Japan and South Korea. The leader diplomacy that Xi put into practice especially toward the near environment is seen as one of the most fundamental strategies reinforcing China’s position in global politics. Xi’s own personal vision, power of persuasion, and establishing close relations with leaders are effective in China’s remaining as a ‘reliable partner’ in times of global instability. Indeed, these contacts realized at the leader level contribute to the reinforcement of trust and friendship between the two countries and to the securing of the strategic partnership.
In the final analysis, Xi’s leader diplomacy is a proactive and strategically well-planned foreign policy move that shapes China from a passive actor continuously staying on the defensive into an actor that personally writes the rules of the global game and reinforces its geopolitical influence with direct relations between leaders. Xi’s Pyongyang visit, which he performed for the first time after 2019, shows that China closely follows the geopolitical changes in the world and takes quick reactions in the face of these changes. Indeed, the visit in question occurred right after the consecutive summits Xi held with Trump and Putin in Beijing. This can be counted as an indicator of how proactive and efficient Xi’s leader diplomacy is.
[i] “Xi and Kim Pledge Closer Ties as North Korea Meeting Enters Second Day,” BBC, https://www.bbc.com/news/live/cdepg4kw985t, (Accessed: June 11, 2026).
[ii] Ibid.
