Chinese President Xi Jinping (習近平) had his first face-to-face meeting with a world leader in nearly two years yesterday as he hosted Russian President Vladimir Putin, with the pair drawing closer as tensions grow with the West.
Xi has not left China since January 2020, when the country was grappling with its initial COVID-19 outbreak and locked down the central city of Wuhan, where the virus was first detected.
He is now readying to meet more than 20 leaders as Beijing begins a Winter Olympics that could be a soft-power triumph and shift focus from a buildup blighted by a diplomatic boycott and fears of COVID-19.
Photo: AP
Xi and Putin met in the Chinese capital before commenting on their shared views regarding security and other issues, a Kremlin adviser said at a media briefing on Wednesday.
The two leaders were then to attend the Olympics opening ceremony yesterday evening.
Spiraling tensions with the West have bolstered ties between the world’s largest nation and its most populous, and Putin was the first foreign leader to confirm his plans to attend the ceremony.
He hailed Russia’s “model” relations with Beijing phone call with Xi in December last year, calling his Chinese counterpart a “dear friend.”
China’s state-run Xinhua news agency on Thursday carried an article from Putin in which the Russian leader painted a portrait of two neighbors with increasingly shared global goals.
“Foreign policy coordination between Russia and China is based on close and coinciding approaches to solving global and regional issues,” Putin wrote.
He also criticized US-led Western diplomatic boycotts of the Beijing Olympics that were sparked by China’s human rights record.
“Sadly, attempts by a number of countries to politicize sports for their selfish interests have recently intensified,” Putin wrote, calling such moves “fundamentally wrong.”
China has become more vocal in backing Russia in its dispute with NATO powers over Ukraine.
Last week, Chinese Minister of Foreign Affairs Wang Yi (王毅) called Russia’s security concerns “legitimate,” saying they should be “taken seriously and addressed.”
Moscow is looking for support after its deployment of 100,000 troops near its border with Ukraine prompted Western nations to warn of an invasion and threaten “severe consequences” in response to any Russian attack.
China enjoyed plentiful support from the Soviet Union — the precursor to the modern Russian state — after the establishment of Communist rule in 1949, but the two socialist powers later fell out over ideological differences.
Good relations resumed as the Cold War ended in the 1990s, and the countries have pursued a strategic partnership in the past decade that has seen them work closely on trade, military and geopolitical issues.
The bonds have strengthened during Xi’s administration, at a time when Russia and China are increasingly at odds with Western powers.
Other leaders scheduled to enjoy Xi’s hospitality during the Games include Egyptian President Abdel Fattah al-Sisi, Saudi Arabian Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman, Kazakh President Kassym-Jomart Tokayev and Polish President Andrzej Duda.
About 21 world leaders are expected to attend the Games.
A majority of those leaders rule over non-democratic regimes, according to the Economist Intelligence Unit’s Democracy Index, with 12 labeled either “authoritarian” or a “hybrid regime.”
‘NEO-NAZIS’: A minister described the rally as ‘spreading hate’ and ‘dividing our communities,’ adding that it had been organized and promoted by far-right groups Thousands of Australians joined anti-immigration rallies across the country yesterday that the center-left government condemned, saying they sought to spread hate and were linked to neo-Nazis. “March for Australia” rallies against immigration were held in Sydney, and other state capitals and regional centers, according to the group’s Web site. “Mass migration has torn at the bonds that held our communities together,” the Web site said. The group posted on X on Saturday that the rallies aimed to do “what the mainstream politicians never have the courage to do: demand an end to mass immigration.” The group also said it was concerned about culture,
CRACKDOWN: The Indonesian president vowed to clamp down on ‘treason and terrorism,’ while acceding to some protest demands to revoke lawmaker benefits Protests in Indonesia over rising living costs and inequality intensified overnight, prompting Indonesian President Prabowo Subianto to cancel a planned trip to China, while demonstrators reportedly targeted the homes of the finance minister and several lawmakers. Rioters entered Indonesian Minister of Finance Sri Mulyani Indrawati’s residence near Jakarta early yesterday, but were repelled by armed forces personnel, Kompas reported. Items were taken from the homes of lawmaker Ahmad Sahroni and two others, according to Detik.com. The reports of looting could not be independently verified, and the finance ministry has not responded to requests for comment. The protests were sparked by outrage over
VENEZUELAN ACTION: Marco Rubio said that previous US interdiction efforts have not stemmed the flow of illicit drugs into the US and that ‘blowing them up’ would US President Donald Trump on Wednesday justified a lethal military strike that his administration said was carried out a day earlier against a Venezuelan gang as a necessary effort by the US to send a message to Latin American cartels. Asked why the military did not instead interdict the vessel and capture those on board, Trump said that the operation would cause drug smugglers to think twice about trying to move drugs into the US. “There was massive amounts of drugs coming into our country to kill a lot of people and everybody fully understands that,” Trump said while hosting Polish President
For more than a century, the fate of the dazzling Darya-e-Noor diamond has been sealed inside a bank vault — a mystery that haunts Khawaja Naim Murad, great-grandson of the last prince, or nawab, of Dhaka. Locked away in 1908, were the family’s heirlooms lost during the violence at the end of British rule in 1947? Did they survive Bangladesh’s war of independence in 1971 and the string of coups that followed, or are they still safe, dusty, but untouched? Many suspect that the jewels are long gone and officials at the state-run bank hesitate to simply open the vault, fearing that they
RSS