China and Russia agree to greater security cooperation

Beijing. China and Russia agreed this Tuesday to deepen security cooperation in the Eurasian region in order to counter the operations launched in the region by the West, while ensuring that their relations have risen to the “highest level in history.” .

Russian Foreign Minister Serguei Lavrov assured after meeting with his Chinese counterpart, Wan Yi, in the Great Hall of the People, in this capital, that the existing Euro-Atlantic security platforms, the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO) and the Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe (OSCE), have “been exhausted as relevant structures capable of any meaningful negotiation based on the balance of interests.”

“The task of forming Eurasian security is necessary. President (Vladimir) Putin mentioned this in his speech to the federal assembly. Our Chinese friends and I have agreed to start a dialogue, with the participation of others with like ideas on this issue,” said the Russian diplomat, quoted by the Sputnik agency, on his second and last day of activities in the Asian giant.

Wang assured that both powers should “oppose hegemonism and power politics, oppose the monopoly of international affairs by a few countries.” He added, quoted by the Chinese Foreign Ministry, that “NATO should not reach out to our common homeland.”

The Chinese diplomat stated: “We see that thanks to the leaders, the Russian-Chinese relations of comprehensive partnership and strategic cooperation have reached an unprecedented level, without any exaggeration. He added that with his Russian counterpart he had a “deep exchange on various hot international and regional issues (…), including the Ukrainian and Palestinian-Israeli conflicts.”

The Russian foreign minister noted that the “so-called peace formula” presented by Ukrainian President Volodimyr Zelensky was “completely far from any reality,” while his Chinese counterpart repeated his government’s calls for a ceasefire and “an early end of the war”.

Hours later, Chinese President Xi Jinping met with Lavrov, state media in both countries reported. “We would like to express our greatest appreciation and admiration for the successes he has achieved over the years and, above all, during the last decade under his leadership,” commented the senior diplomat.

““We are sincerely satisfied with these successes, since they are successes of friends, although not everyone in the world shares this attitude and is trying by all means to slow down the development of China, in fact, the same as the development of Russia,” he noted. the Russian official.

Just weeks before Russia invaded Ukraine, Putin visited Beijing for the opening of the 2022 Winter Olympics and the sides signed a pact promising a “boundless” relationship in which China supports Russia’s line, even as it urges formally to peace talks.