China is quietly constructing an influence ecosystem in the greater Black Sea region that transcends mere commerce. Energy corridors, digital infrastructure, free-trade frameworks, and political alignments are converging to give Beijing lasting leverage in Eurasia. Central to this effort is China’s asymmetric but deepening relationship with Russia, which increasingly functions less as a coequal partner than a dependent proxy.
China’s Foreign Direct Investment (FDI) push, grain corridor diplomacy, and investments in telecom and transit infrastructure may seem disconnected. But together, they trace the contours of Beijing’s evolving political economy strategy: an ecosystem of influence built through infrastructure development, regulatory access, elite cultivation, and, increasingly, formal political agreements.
Economic Vectors of Influence
In Georgia, China and Tbilisi signed a free-trade agreement in 2017, followed by a strategic partnership in July 2023 that expanded cooperation into infrastructure, communications, digital governance, and finance. In May 2024, Tbilisi and Beijing introduced visa-free travel. Chinese companies have since increasingly embedded themselves in high-impact sectors: the Hualing Free Industrial Zone in Kutaisi, AIIB-funded roads near Batumi, and high-visibility efforts to develop the Anaklia deep-water port. Meanwhile, Huawei and ZTE equipment is common across Georgia’s telecom infrastructure, with tenders extending into local government digital services and surveillance systems.
While the European Union has put constraints on Chinese tech, penetration persists through legacy systems and smaller-scale IT contracts. While Romania has seen the share of Chinese components drop in its telecom infrastructure, a recent report showed that Bulgaria continued to have an extensive Chinese-built network.
Meanwhile, after years of growing economic ties tempered by mutual strategic skepticism, Turkey-China ties have improved in recent years as bilateral trade and investments have ripened, though largely in Beijing’s favor. Nearby, Azerbaijan’s relationship with China has expanded rapidly. After a visa-free regime was introduced in early 2024, Baku and Beijing signed a comprehensive strategic partnership agreement in April 2025, formalizing cooperation on digital infrastructure, AI applications, energy logistics, and soft-power platforms like Confucius Institutes. Notably, in contrast to Georgia and Azerbaijan, Armenia has not elected to move forward with major economic or political deals with China, despite some economic investments and broader cooperation potentially on offer.
Russia and Beijing’s Political Leverage
The China-Russia relationship is foundational to understanding China’s regional posture. Rather than an alliance of equals, the partnership has evolved into an asymmetric dependency: Russia supplies discounted energy and geopolitical disruption, while China delivers technology, trade flows, and financial lifelines. In 2024, bilateral trade surpassed $240 billion, and Chinese companies became key suppliers of dual-use goods—many rebranded as civilian—to Russia’s drone and electronics sectors.
What China wants in Ukraine is not a quick Russian victory, which seems unlikely in any foreseeable scenario in the short- to medium-term, but a prolonged war that pins down NATO and forces transactional fatigue across Europe. Beijing’s FDI in Ukraine collapsed after the 2022 invasion—nearly zeroing out by 2024—but it maintained limited symbolic presence through grain purchases in U.N.-brokered Black Sea corridors and diplomatic gestures meant to project neutrality. In practice, Ukraine is geopolitically useful to China as a pressure point, not an investment target.
The real focus is elsewhere. In the greater Black Sea and Caucasus, Chinese economic engagements increasingly serve political ends. This is not simply about building infrastructure but potentially shaping decisionmaking environments. For instance, transit and telecom investments often come with regulatory entanglements: Chinese SOEs and tech firms insert themselves into procurement networks and form long-term service contracts that are difficult to unwind. These engagements lead, over time, to elite relationships, such as shared ventures, advisory deals, special hiring practices—and an increasing reliance on Chinese capital or technology for local development agendas.
As influence consolidates, strategic partnerships often follow. In Georgia, Azerbaijan, and Hungary, political upgrades to “strategic” or “comprehensive strategic” partnerships were not driven by ideological convergence but by accumulated ties across infrastructure, digital governance, and trade. Once these agreements are in place, countries tend to drift toward Chinese diplomatic positions: affirming the One-China policy, coordinating in multilateral forums, and resisting criticism of Chinese domestic repression.
Hungary offers the most vivid European example. Although not a Black Sea state, it signed a bilateral security partnership with China in 2024 that includes law enforcement cooperation and counterterrorism coordination—marking the first such agreement between China and an EU member. This reflects not only Budapest’s strategic drift but a well-defined case study in China’s comfort in using economic gravity to shape political loyalties.
Toward a Layered Map of Influence
China’s engagement in the Black Sea is not a string of one-off deals. It is an ecosystem approach: infrastructure lays the groundwork for elite access, which then facilitates formal partnerships that anchor long-term political and institutional alignment. Where EU frameworks impose scrutiny, as in Romania or Bulgaria, China’s progress is slower and often contested. Where governance is more personalized or fragmented, such as in Georgia or Azerbaijan, Chinese firms embed quickly, and political agreements follow.
China only needs to shape the environment—digitally, economically, and diplomatically—in ways that limit Western coherence and create persistent space for Chinese leverage.
China neither needs nor necessarily seeks to dominate the region outright. It only needs to shape the environment—digitally, economically, and diplomatically—in ways that limit Western coherence and create persistent space for Chinese leverage. Russia, for all its belligerence, plays a complementary role in this effort: destabilizing NATO’s periphery while becoming increasingly reliant on Beijing. Yet, hopes to disrupt the Russia-China relationship are unlikely to succeed precisely because their interests, worldviews, and strategic cultures align. Russia’s imperial gaze is directed to Europe, primarily, and the contagion that results suits Beijing’s goals well.
Tracking this convergence—where economic presence becomes political influence—is essential for understanding the strategic future of the Black Sea and broader Eurasia. The evidence already suggests a deliberate architecture. What comes next is watching how it consolidates, how states resist or absorb it, and what it means for the next phase of global competition.
