In meeting with Xi Jinping, Putin condemns US provocations against Russia and China

Putin and Xi Jinping meet in Uzbekistan (SCMP).

Imposing a polar world subject to Washington is unacceptable, the Russian leader underlined. Xi Jinping has highlighted friendship with Russia and China’s desire to become a global power responsible for supporting sustainable and sustainable development of the planet.

China’s President Xi Jinping and Russia’s Vladimir Putin met in Samarkand, Uzbekistan on Thursday (15), in the first face-to-face meeting between the two leaders since the start of military operations in Ukraine. Xi and Putin are attending the Shanghai Cooperation Organization (SCO) summit, strengthening ties amid global tensions with the United States.

The two leaders sat across from each other and were surrounded by their advisers ahead of the start of the meeting, which will also feature the leaders of India, Pakistan, Turkey, Iran and others.

For the Chinese president, this is his first overseas trip since the early days of the Covid-19 pandemic. Shi said he was overjoyed to be reunited with “my old friend”.

“At the global level, we are ready, together with our Russian counterparts, to play an important role in the world in order to be an example of a responsible world power in the face of the greatest changes of our time, unprecedented in history. Stability and positive energy.

He also stressed during the meeting that the leaders of Russia and China “in the face of the global pandemic, we continue to maintain effective strategic communication, mainly through phone calls.”

Efforts to create a unipolar world are unacceptable

The Russian president, in turn, criticized the United States for directing military aid to Ukraine and international sanctions against Moscow.

“Attempts to create a unipolar world have recently taken a completely ugly form and are completely unacceptable,” Putin said. “We highly appreciate the balanced stance of our Chinese friends on the Ukrainian crisis,” he added.

The Russian president reiterated Moscow’s support for Beijing over Taiwan, where visits by US officials in recent weeks have fueled Chinese anger and pushback in defense of its sovereignty.

“We condemn US provocation,” the Russian president said, adding that Moscow adheres to the “one China” policy, according to which Taiwan is an integral part of Chinese territory.

In a sign of their rapprochement in the face of Western tensions, Russian and Chinese ships conducted joint patrols in the Pacific Ocean on Thursday to “strengthen their maritime cooperation.”

According to state media in Beijing, citing President Xi, China is ready to support the “fundamental interests” of both countries with Russia.

China has so far not openly supported the move in Ukraine, but has built economic and strategic ties with Russia over the months of the conflict and Xi has expressed support for the country’s “sovereignty and security” and the entire region.

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It was the first meeting between Xi and Putin since they met in Beijing in February for the Winter Olympics, shortly before Russia began its operations in Ukraine. At the time, the two celebrated their “endless” friendship.

The Chinese president will meet his Belarusian counterpart in Uzbekistan, Alexander Lukashenko, as an observer at the SCO, Russia’s closest ally.

After the trip, Xi Jinping is reasserting himself as a global leader ahead of a crucial Chinese Communist Party congress in October at which he will be elected to a new term.

The main OCS meeting will take place on Friday (16), but the event that has sparked the most public interest is the meeting between the leaders of Russia and China.

Made up of China, Russia, India, Pakistan, Kazakhstan, Uzbekistan, Kyrgyzstan and Tajikistan, the OCS was established in 2001 as a political, economic and security body to avoid being held hostage by Western institutions controlled by the US.

“The SCO offers a real alternative to Western-centric organizations,” Kremlin foreign policy adviser Yuri Ushakov said this week.

It is not a formal military alliance like NATO or a unified body like the European Union, but its members work together on security issues, military cooperation and trade development.

Besides Xi, Putin also met Iranian President Ibrahim Raisi on Thursday. On Friday, he is scheduled to meet Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi and Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan.

Xi’s bilateral agenda remains unclear. A possible meeting with India’s Modi is under consideration, after 2019 and 2020 after clashes on the disputed Himalayan border.

A historical turning point

The high expectations of the summit are anticipated by the host country’s President Shavkat Mirziyoyev, who wrote an essay during the event in which he highlighted that the world is currently facing a “‘period of historical disintegration’. An era ends and another begins, unpredictable and even unknown.”

In this sense, according to the Uzbek leader, the leaders’ meeting is an example of how to promote “an inclusive dialogue based on the principles of mutual respect for common security and prosperity.” Reconciling states with “different foreign policy priorities”.