Chinese President Xi Jinping and Russian President Vladimir Putin on Thursday (16/5/2024) promised a “new era” of partnership between the two most powerful rivals of the United States (US), which they see as an aggressive Cold War hegemon who sowed chaos in the whole world.
Xi welcomed Putin on a red carpet outside the Great Hall of the People in Beijing, where they were greeted by rows of People’s Liberation Army soldiers, a 21-gun salute in Tiananmen Square, and children waving Chinese and Russian flags.
China and Russia declared a seamless partnership in February 2022 when Putin visited Beijing just days before he sent tens of thousands of troops into Ukraine, sparking Europe’s deadliest land war since the Second World War.
Xi, 70, and Putin, 71, signed a joint statement on Thursday on a ‘new era’ that expressed opposition to the US on a number of security issues and shared views on everything from Taiwan and Ukraine to North Korea and cooperation in new areas namely peaceful nuclear technology and finance.
“Current China-Russia relations were hard-won, and both sides need to cherish and nurture them,” Xi told Putin, quoted by Reuters.
“China is willing to jointly achieve the development and rejuvenation of our respective countries, and work together to uphold fairness and justice in the world,” he continued.
Russia, waging war against North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO)-supplied Ukrainian forces, and China, under pressure from concerted US efforts to counter its growing military and economic power, increasingly find common geopolitical goals.
Xi has told Putin that the two have a chance to drive changes unprecedented in the world over the past century, in what many analysts see as an attempt to challenge the US-led global order.
Their governments, seeking to counter the shame felt by the collapse of the Soviet Union in 1991 and centuries of European colonial domination of China, sought to portray Western countries as decadent and in decline, with China challenging US supremacy in everything from quantum computing and synthetic biology to espionage and violent military power.
But China and Russia face their own challenges, including a slowing Chinese economy and the emboldening and expanding NATO following Russia’s invasion of Ukraine.
Washington considers China its biggest competitor and Russia its biggest national threat.
The US views both as authoritarian rulers who have eliminated free speech and imposed strict domestic controls on the media and courts. Biden called Xi a dictator and said Putin was a killer and even a “crazy SOB.” Beijing and Moscow have criticized Biden over the comments.
