China privately told Finland it would prevent Russia from using nuclear weapons, Stubb says

China has privately told Finland it will not allow Russia to use nuclear weapons. Finnish President Alexander Stubb disclosed the assurance in an interview published Saturday, framing Beijing as perhaps the single most important check on Moscow’s most dangerous impulse.

What Stubb actually said

Speaking to Paul Ronzheimer of the Axel Springer Global Reporters Network, Stubb described Chinese Foreign Minister Wang Yi’s pledge during a visit to Helsinki in July 2026. Wang reportedly told Stubb that Beijing would “never allow” Russia to deploy nuclear weapons in its war against Ukraine.

Stubb called the Chinese commitment an “effective deterrent.” When asked directly whether Russia could resort to nuclear weapons, the Finnish president was emphatic: it will not happen.

He went further, arguing that Russia’s options for escalation have narrowed considerably. In Stubb’s assessment, Moscow’s only remaining path to intensify the conflict is mobilization, not nuclear strikes and certainly not a direct attack on NATO. Intelligence assessments, he said, support the view that a Russian assault on the alliance would be implausible given NATO’s combined conventional and nuclear capabilities.