While Joe Biden made a surprise visit to Kyiv yesterday, Russia received its own signal of foreign support with Wang Yi's visit to Moscow. The top Chinese diplomat participated in the Munich Security Conference last week, where he reiterated a call for dialogue and suggested that European countries "think calmly" about how to end the war. "No matter how difficult the situation is, we cannot stop looking for peace," he said.
In the German city, Wang Yi met with the Ukrainian Foreign Minister, Dimitro Kuleba, to whom he reiterated that Beijing "has always been on the side of peace and dialogue."
Wang, who heads the Office of the Foreign Commission of the Communist Party of China and is above the foreign minister, yesterday reiterated that message in Budapest (Hungary), where he made a stopover before continuing to Moscow. "China and Hungary work together with other peace-loving countries to end the current war situation as soon as possible," he said. The Kremlin said yesterday that on this two-day visit, Wang could meet Russian President Vladimir Putin, to whom he could discuss Chinese ideas for peace.
China has so far remained neutral in the conflict between Russia and Ukraine. On the one hand, he has called for respect for "the territorial integrity of all countries", including Ukraine, and on the other, that attention be paid to "the legitimate concerns of all countries", in reference to Russia.
Over the weekend, US Secretary of State Antony Blinken repeated that Washington is concerned that China might consider sending weapons to Russia. Beijing warned the US yesterday to stay out of its relationship with Russia. His foreign spokesman, Wang Wenbin, responded in Beijing that Washington "is not in a position to make demands on China." And he pointed out that "China's comprehensive cooperative partnership with Russia is based on non-alignment, non-confrontation and non-aggression to third parties, and is a matter of the sovereignty of two independent countries."
