Ukraine: Lukashenko from Xi, “full support” to China
Belarus declares its support for China’s comprehensive security plan, in an initial response from a Russian ally of appreciation of the plan for the political solution to the war in Ukraine presented by Beijing last week. The OK to the Chinese initiative came from the Belarusian president, Alexander Lukashenkowho arrived yesterday in Beijing, and who today met his Chinese counterpart, Xi Jinping, at the Great Hall of the People in Tiananmen Square.
The meeting is being held at a “very difficult time, which requires new non-standard approaches and responsible political decisions,” Lukashenko said. It is necessary “to prevent slipping into a global confrontation in which there will be no winners”, added the Belarusian leader, and that is why, “Belarus is actively making proposals for peace and wholeheartedly supports the initiative on international security from you advance”. The agreement with Beijing also concerns bilateral relations.
Ukraine: Lukashenko from Xi, “full support” for China
For Minsk, “there are no topics closed to cooperation”, Lukashenko said in today’s meeting with outgoing Chinese prime minister Li Keqiang. The one with Belarus is an “indissoluble” friendship, was Xi’s praise of relations between Beijing and Minsk, and moving on to the Ukrainian question, the Chinese president mentioned for the first time the twelve-point document for peace, published last week by the Beijing Foreign Ministry. China, Xi said, will continue to promote peace talks and political settlement of the war in Ukraine, and urges everyone to abandon the “Cold War mentality” to resolve the crisis. “The core of China’s position is to promote peace talks,” the Chinese president said, and “we must stick to the direction of political settlement and abandon any Cold War mentality.”
Xi then reiterated the importance of respecting the security concerns of all countries and – in a warning that sounds directed at the United States, never directly named – he added that one must not “politicize and exploit the world economy” and that things must be done that serve to “peacefully resolve the crisis”. Beijing’s twelve-point plan for the political solution to the Ukrainian crisis has so far garnered a lot of skepticism in the West for the ties between Beijing and Moscow, and the Chinese proposal is countered by suspicions that China may support Russia militarily. The war in Ukraine will be one of the most important points of the discussions over the next few hours in Delhi, where the foreign ministers of the G20 countries will meet – with delegates from 40 countries, the Indian organization says, in one of the major meetings in this format never hosted – but twists and turns seem to be excluded at the moment. US Secretary of State, Antony Blinkcurrently visiting Kazakhstan and Uzbekistan, has ruled out meeting the head of Moscow’s diplomacy, Sergei Lavrov, or his Chinese counterpart, Qin Gang, who will leave tomorrow for the Indian capital, on the sidelines of the G20 ministerial meetings of the next few days.
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