Chinese President Xi Jinping and his Russian counterpart Vladimir Putin held hours of talks in Moscow on Tuesday, vowing a deeper partnership between the two anti-Western nuclear-armed powers in meetings overshadowed by a surprise trip to Ukraine by the Japanese prime minister. , Fumio Kishida.
Wearing matching red ties on the second day of a state visit to show Chinese support for Russia in the face of Western sanctions over the invasion of Ukraine, Xi and Putin held a dramatic ceremony in the Kremlin’s ornate St. George Hall, meeting on a long red carpet under large national flags.
The Russian state news agency TASS reported that their informal meeting lasted almost four and a half hours, with a second formal meeting to take place later on Tuesday.
Putin said he and Xi had signed joint statements on plans for economic cooperation and on deepening their partnership, which has grown as Beijing and Moscow increasingly seek a united front against the United States and the West. Xi said he invited Putin to visit China later this year for a high-level meeting of China’s One Belt, One Road initiative.
A statement on Ukraine issued late on Tuesday reinforced a clear message of Chinese support for Russia in the conflict, despite Beijing’s claim of neutrality.
“Russia welcomes China’s readiness to play a positive role in a politico-diplomatic settlement of the Ukraine crisis and the constructive ideas laid out in the document prepared by the Chinese side,” the statement, translated by the news agency, said. Reuters news.
“The Chinese side positively assesses the Russian side’s willingness to make efforts to restart peace talks as soon as possible,” he said without elaborating.
PM of Japan in Kyiv
As the Moscow meetings were taking place, Japan’s Kishida, who will chair the Group of Seven summit in May, traveled by train to Kiev to meet Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy. The Japanese leader also visited Bucha, the scene of an alleged massacre last year by Russian forces, and laid a wreath in front of a church.
“I really feel great anger at the atrocity visiting that very place here,” Kishida said.
Zelenskyy called Kishida “a truly powerful defender of the international order and a long-time friend of Ukraine” after meeting in central Kiev, according to Reuters.
Kishida’s trip, the first by a post-war Japanese leader to a war zone, showcased “two very different Europe-Pacific partnerships,” US Ambassador to Japan Rahm Emanuel tweeted on Tuesday.
“Kishida stands for freedom and Xi stands for a war criminal,” Emanuel said, referring to an arrest warrant issued on Friday by the International Criminal Court, which wants to put Putin on trial for the abductions of thousands of Ukrainian children.
Denying the kidnapping allegations, Vassily Nebenzia, a senior Kremlin envoy to the United Nations, told a UN briefing on Monday that Russia took the children because it “wanted to spare them the danger that military activities can bring.” said Associated. Press reported.
Kremlin talking points
The United States and its allies remain wary of Xi’s 12-point peace plan for Ukraine because it supports the Kremlin’s main talking points and does not call for the withdrawal of Russian occupation troops from Ukrainian territory.
US Secretary of State Antony Blinken warned Monday against a ceasefire that would leave the conflict unresolved and allow Russia to rearm and resume fighting at a time of its choosing.
“The world must not be fooled by any tactical move by Russia, with the support of China or any other country, to freeze the war on its own terms,” Blinken told reporters in Washington.
Defending China’s proposal from the podium in Beijing, Chinese Foreign Ministry spokesman Wang Wenbin accused Washington of prolonging the conflict.
“The United States should look objectively at the efforts of China and the world at large to promote peace talks, rather than clinging to the Cold War mentality, let alone being a factor in the prolongation and escalation of the conflict,” said.
“What we are asking for comes down to supporting peace talks,” Wang added.
