Hong Kong
CNN
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Chinese leader Xi Jinping vowed to take relations with Russia to a new level this year in a video conference with President Vladimir Putin on Tuesday, hours after US President Donald Trump’s inauguration.
It is an annual tradition for the two leaders to meet around New Year’s, a personal meeting that has helped solidify a partnership between the two countries that only strengthened as Putin waged war on Ukraine. It is a characteristic of close relationships.
According to a statement from China’s Ministry of Foreign Affairs, Mr. Xi expressed readiness to “take China-Russia relations to new heights” and respond to “external uncertainties” with “stability and resilience of China-Russia relations”. did.
President Xi told the Russian president, who appeared via video link on a large screen in Beijing’s Great Hall of the People during a conference call, that the two countries should deepen “strategic cooperation” and “practical cooperation” and “firmly support each other.” he said.
Putin praised the two countries’ trade expansion, which hit a record high last year, according to Chinese data, and hinted at a shared ambition to rebuild a world order that the United States sees as unfairly dominated.
“We are united in advocating a more just, multipolar world order and strive to ensure indivisible security both in Eurasian space and the world,” Putin told Xi, according to a Kremlin statement. ” he said. Joint efforts between Russia and China “objectively play a major stabilizing role in the international situation,” he asserted.
The phone call between the two dictators came as both sides were closely watching President Trump’s return to the White House.
Both leaders have each publicly expressed a desire to reset fraught relations with the United States under a new administration. President Trump has also expressed interest in engaging and meeting with both leaders early in his presidency, but it remains to be seen how conciliatory or hard-line the new administration will take toward either of the U.S. rivals. It’s unknown.
Mr. Xi and Mr. Trump had their own phone conversation days before the U.S. presidential inauguration, and Mr. Trump later said the conversation touched on a wide range of topics, including the war in Ukraine.
Kremlin aide Yuri Ushakov said Xi told Putin about the call during more than an hour and a half of talks between the two leaders on Tuesday, and the timing of the call coincided with Trump’s inauguration. He added that it was unrelated.
“The issue of the relationship between the two countries and the United States was also raised,” he said. “In this context, the leaders naturally discussed certain aspects regarding the development of potential contacts with the US administration,” Ushakov said, according to Russia’s state-run TASS news agency.
While President Trump has expressed personal admiration for both dictators, he has also called for concessions from both sides in an effort to balance the economic playing field between the United States and China and end President Putin’s attack on Ukraine. is also expected.
President Trump on Tuesday said he would consider imposing additional sanctions on Russia if Putin does not come to the negotiating table to end the war.
“We’re talking to (Ukrainian President Volodymyr) Zelensky. We’ll be talking to President Putin soon, and we’ll see what happens and how it happens,” Trump said.
Trump also suggested that Xi wants to use his influence to help mediate an end to the conflict, noting that in a recent phone call, he urged the Chinese leader to “work things out.” did.
European leaders have long hoped that Mr. Xi would play a role in coaxing Mr. Putin into accepting peace terms in Ukraine, but Mr. Trump’s entry into the White House and his expressed desire to end the war have made it clear that China has no role to play. A new possibility has been added.
That could be a delicate balancing act for the Chinese government. Mr. Xi has long sought to portray China as a potential peace broker in the conflict, even though the United States and its allies have accused China of supporting Russia’s war effort with munitions exports. However, China denies this. President Xi is also believed to want to build a good relationship with President Trump to avoid potentially harmful tariffs as China’s economy slumps.
However, Chinese leaders may also want to be careful not to damage their partnership with Russia. Mr. Xi and Mr. Putin signed an “unrestricted” partnership weeks before Mr. Putin’s invasion, and Mr. Xi sees Russia as a key partner in broader frictions with the West.
Neither the Kremlin statement nor China’s Foreign Ministry said whether the Ukraine war was discussed during Tuesday’s phone call between Putin and Xi.
Instead, both readings referred to the 80th anniversary of the Allied victory shared by Beijing and Moscow in World War II. Mr. Xi and Mr. Putin have invited each other to commemorate the victory together at events this year in Russia in May and China in September, the Kremlin announced on Tuesday.
CNN’s Betsy Klein and Fred He contributed to this report.
