a with subscribe to w documentary on youtube. you're watching d. w. news asia coming up today. as russia continues, it's offensive in ukraine, many policy makers in europe and beyond our asking whether china can help as a mediator to end this conflict will take a closer look. plus people in taiwan, also fear a giant neighbor to the north and see the rooster ukrainian war as a cautionary tale and a massive wake of call. ah,

i melissa chan, thanks for joining us with russia bombarding ukrainian cities and with evidence. hooton's army is targeting civilians. there is tremendous desire to make the horse stop and some policy makers are looking at china. aging has made early attempts to position itself as a peacemaker here, but the close relationship between chinese liter shooting, ping, and russian leader vladimir putin prompts questions about just how neutral china can be once bitter rivals, china and russia are now as close as frenemy can be the start of the winter olympics and beijing last month. so she, jim ping and vladimir putin declare a new era, a no limits partnership backing each other over stand offs and ukraine and taiwan with a promise to collaborate more against the west. china likes to present itself as an

honest broker in the conflict, but following the russian invasion, beijing has largely cited with its neighbor and close security partner russia. and rather than criticize moscow, the chinese government instead blames the u. s. for causing the crisis. he bought it, we hope all parties will work together with china to deescalate tensions, instead of adding fuel to the fire and promote a diplomatic solution i. china will continue to play a constructive role in seeking and realizing piece arbiter yahoo unit. she is a long time admirer of putin and the 2 autocratic leaders have formed a strong bond. johnny denies that it knew about the invasion in advance and had asked russia to wait until the olympics were over before attacking ukraine. flood, professing neutrality. beijing stance is geared more towards moscow. china abstained on votes at the united nations on sanctioning russia and demanding the withdrawal of russian troops. the chinese refused to acknowledge that russia has

invaded ukraine admission to me. china is clearly watching the west reaction to the invasion, especially when it comes to its own efforts to take control of self rule taiwan. at the national people's congress, china's annual rubber stamp parliament beijing hike. this year's defense spending by 7 point one percent. while the ukraine crisis is putting pressure on china, beijing's priorities like closer to home with taiwan. joining us in the studio is clifford coon and who filed that report? a clifford? oh, what qualifies china? to be a peacemaker and all of this? well, on the surface you would think it would be a good candidate. i'm in the, it's got good relations with both ukraine and russia. and both countries were china's well up, china as their biggest trading partner had before this and, and they also have really close relations between she and couldn't. but as we've seen, maybe the relations are too close. and this is pretty much what disqualifies it as, as a peacemaker. it's basically, it's more about,

in some ways what it's not doing that about what it's doing because it's, but by not voting, in favor of sanctioning russia and by not taking part in the sanctions. and there's a sort of herb, and it's basically enabling what russia is doing. and by not calling it an invasion too. so there's a lot of reasons where we're sort of seeing that. and in a way, china has kind of using this diplomatic language and saying that it's, you know, it's on the fans sitting on the fence. but if it's sitting on the fence, it's definitely leaning much more toward sir, towards china. re an of course, aging must e m, watching this very closely. everything that's happening. what do you think are some of their takeaways? well i, i think they're going to find it a bit disturbing and some levels. and i think 1st of all, ad is a big question mark about how much they knew in advance about the invasion. and presuming that at the opening of the winter olympics put and did mention something . and which are, you know, there is some evidence that may have happened, but i think they were expecting a short invasion,

unsuccessful invasion. and i think they were expecting the west not to get its act together and to come out with the kind of sanctions that it has. so am, i think the combination of these 2 things has, has lead to and, you know, i think they won't like what they've seen and dam one ye, the foreign minister who is seen talking to day and has given us a pretty good view now of what the chinese stance is on, on, on the russian invasion. maybe we can look at the year. the quote, to work with china. russia relationship is grounded in the clear logic of history and driven by strong internal dynamics. and the friendship between chinese and russian peoples is rock solid. was a bright prospect for cooperation o'clock. so you can see from that sort of language there that clearly they are. you know that there's no ambiguity. now i think that they have thrown their weight behind russia, and this the constant i'm talking about what the u. s. is doing all that rather than focusing on the invasion. so i think we have a lot more clarity now about where,

where china's stands. i think everyone is i'm making this comparison. but how does the situation in ukraine inform on what might happen in taiwan? this is a big fear of the see. it's a big fear in taiwan in the run up. and apparently there's people in the streets in taiwan saying, today, ukraine to mar taiwan is obviously a lot of fear am and the constant references to sovereignty have also caused alarm bells and taiwan em, i think, did under leadership, there has tried to keep things calm. i think they're very different militarily seen . i think it's much, it's much harder to invade an island where you have to cross the sea rather than the land invasion. and even the land invasion, as we're seeing in them in the ukraine, isn't happening at the kind of speed that they were expecting. it's no longer a blitzkrieg. it's actually now more of a slow war of attrition. almost. there are a lot more mountains in taiwan. exactly. and, and also, and it said, you know,

that the thing is that if we, if russia isn't going to occupy ukraine, but presumably china would take taiwan to keepers. and if you keep it against the wishes of the people, it's extremely difficult. so while i think i deserve the understandable fear and we never know how things are going to turn out, but i think that the fact that they're different also the fact that this is a very big year for she, jim ping hits the year and she's going to be establishing himself as a leader for life. so i think that probably in terms of an immediate threat of invasion, i don't think it's there. but there's always the suspicion that they could be dividing the 2. and you know, that looking more at sort of dividing attention of the us, perhaps that's always a risk. but if i had to make a call, i would say, i don't think there's going to be an invasion immediately, very, very quickly. and neighbors, south china sea, they're, they're getting nervous with this when they, when they look at all this, i think similarly to the tooth to china. so to taiwan,

they're getting this similar activity, similar, a reaction there that there is nerves, i think about the way this is playing out because of china's ambitions. and so china c. clifford, thank you so much as always ah . and sticking to the topic of taiwan, the war in europe has certainly caught the attention of people there for decades. they lived with a possibility that beijing might capture the independent island, which is completely self governed, and one of the world's 20 largest economies. here's dw joyce lee with more this carp, hawkish, destiny, touch to be an air raid shouted in the front of an emergency amid the russia ukraine war, the taiwanese government has instructed local police to check or underground spaces . they are more than a 100000 bomb shout, has in taiwan more than enough to house all this 24000000 people. the authorities

recently added a new mobile app feature to how people locate the close a site with their father. because of the ukraine crisis, more people have watched the promo video of our app. it shows the taiwanese people are concerned about where they can find shelter or yoga, and glancing. many in taiwan, see paralyzed with ukraine. china has not ruled out a use of force to quote reunify with the south route to island. and for the past few years, beijing has been standing warplanes to tie wants eddie, been sewn on a daily basis. taiwan has been under beijing's threat for 7 decades, so it's become a part of daily life. and people even joke about having a wall, just like the ukrainians dead before the invasion. so what happened in ukraine is a wake up call for the taiwanese many see a need for greater self reliance as soon as the war broke out ukrainians in taiwan were joined by lo coast in anti war rallies, mindset off for pain,

and she didn't paint are unfortunately, very similar, if with him can invade ukraine just like this without any reason because there is no reason. then of course i want these people. if it also be alert, we're kind of afraid there will be a physical asian have of in our one room will never know who we are. work called the older agra piley's air growth drill. alden's garden hydrate. despite the worries expos say across straight wall is unlikely for now, it's too risky for beijing to launch a landing operation given the empty ship. my soul tie one has precedence seizing, being also pirate, isis internal stability ahead of a congress later this year in which his expected to take a historic 3rd term as party. heave none the last, ty wants defense, ministry is on high alert. they are caused for an increase in defense spending. so the, the galvan is on take israel and singapore, for example, their defense spending accounts for more than 5 percent of their g d. p for your

tie, one should raise it to at least 3 percent. if we invest more in our military, they chose our determination to defend ourselves and turn our allies will be more willing to help us. the logo, you had quite good call. last week us president joe biden, santa delegation of former top security officials to taiwan. as a show of support to the island, beijing reacted furiously with state media, calling it an obvious provocation on the taiwan side and on this side. morale has been booster, significantly adding to the taiwanese must be on alert, but not panic. i made the rising tension from gorda, the china is setting a truck. they try to make tie when he's people tense all the time, so he get tard and numbed them. they can seize opportunities to launch, surprise attacks, cell key, white support. uptake. keep calm and carry on tony's people have been doing this for 70 years, and they're not going to change this mentality for the time being. in addition to

the delegation sent by the biden administration, former secretary of state, mike pompeo from the previous trump administration, also decided to visit ty, wine. he had this warning about shifting pins, motivations, shipping things, intentions are deep. i, his agenda is global and hedge a monic there. there's no doubt about that. but i want presents and democracy that has great friends around the world and great friends in the region. and i am convinced that there are a number of ways in which a shipping is watching, what's happening to vladimir putin, to the russian military inside of ukraine today. that must be giving him great pause for having for having met with latimer putin just to several weeks ago and said that their relationship was unlimited. really, underscoring there that the u. s. position on taiwan is bipartisan. something both republicans and democrats can agree on, which is not that common these days in us politics. that's it for monday,

we'll be taking a look at how this war in europe impacts events in asia all week on the program. see you tomorrow, and by 3 . imagine how many pollution floods thrown out in the world right now. climate change, very often story. this is much less the way from just one week. how much work can really get we still have time to go. i'm going all with what 5th, his subscriber all morning. like in full

live and on demand, comcast and language courses with video and audio. any time. anywhere. the d w media center ah, the global energy industry in crisis gas and oil prices, a surging as the u. s and europe consider banning enforce from russia that can they live without russian energy and europe, russian own gas storage facilities, all proving a source of concern. lucas say they've had enough of helping to fund the kremlin. facilitate of your business on roberts, in berlin. welcome to the program. energy industry leaders are gathering in texas

with their sector in crisis. russia's invasion of ukraine has delivered a shock to oil and gas markets and energy firms are under pressure to take a stand against moscow. governments are also planning to turn up the heat. international sanctions against russia have so far excluded the country's energy sector. but that's about to change. the u. s. and europe are exploring a ban on imports of russian oil and gas attendees of sarah week and annual energy conference in houston are discussing how to replace russian supply. now we see that the u. s. is, is looking to venezuela is considering getting increased production from venezuela? well those barrels from canada, melbourne, canada says it has spear pipeline and rail capacity and can move more oil to the united state.