Xi, on his first trip outside China since the start of the pandemic, met with Putin in the ancient Uzbek city on the Silk Road, samarkandwhere they will attend a summit of the Shanghai Cooperation Organization (SCO).
In their first face-to-face meeting since Russia’s invasion of Ukraine began, Putin praised Xi for his position on the war, but also said he understood Beijing has “questions and concerns” about the conflict.
China has refrained from condemning the Russian operation against Ukraine or calling it an “invasion”, in line with the kremlinwhich describes the war as a “special military operation”.
“We highly value the balanced position of our Chinese friends when it comes to the Ukraine crisis,” Putin said. “We understand your questions and your concern about it. During today’s meeting, we will of course explain our position.”
Putin explicitly backed China in relation to Taiwan, a huge point of tension with the United States. “We have the intention of firmly adhere to the ‘one China’ principlePutin said. “We condemn the provocations of the United States and its satellites in the Taiwan Strait.”
“China is willing to make efforts with Russia to shoulder its responsibility as great powersand take the role of guide to inject stability and positive energy in a chaotic world,” President Xi told Putin during a meeting.
Russia and China, a key alliance
The deepening of the partnership between Xi and Putin is considered one of the most significant developments in geopolitics after the spectacular rise of China itself in the last 40 years.
Russia, once the leading country in the world communist hierarchy, after the collapse of the Soviet Union in 1991, is now a junior partner to a resurgent China that is forecast to it will overtake the United States as the world’s largest economy in the next decade.
Xi, the son of a communist revolutionary who has publicly praised the jewels of Russian literature, and Putin, who grew up in Leningradnow St. Petersburg, and came of age in the KGB from the Soviet era, they say their relationships were never better.
Although Russia and China have been rivals in the past and have fought wars, Putin and Xi share a worldview that sees West as decadent and in decline, just as China challenges US supremacy.
While Europe tries to move away from Russian oil and gas, Putin will try to boost energy exports to China and Asiapossibly with a pipeline through Mongolia. Putin, Xi and Mongolian President Ukhnaa Khürelsükh are scheduled to hold a three-way meeting in Samarkand.
Source: Ambito
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