The Russian and Chinese presidents attended Friday 4 February, at the opening ceremony of the Games and published a long joint statement “on the entry of international affairs in a new era”.
by and
In December 2020, by sanctioning Russia for its institutionalized practice of doping, the arbitral tribunal of sport had the delicacy of providing for a derogation from the prohibition on Russian officials to attend Olympic events – a “joker “Offering the Head of State Organizing the right to invite whoever seems to him.
This paragraph allowed Xi Jinping to invite Vladimir Putin at the opening ceremony of the Olympic Winter Games, Friday 4 February, in the National Stadium of Beijing. What to relativize the impression of isolation of China, due to the withdrawal or boycott of the number of leaders, Westerners in the first place. What, above all, highlight the magnitude of the rapprochement operated in recent years between Moscow and Beijing, wearing the relationship between the two countries at an “unprecedented” level, according to Mr. Putin’s words.
The reception of the Russian President by Mr. XI for nearly three hours, the signing of about fifteen documents, including commercial, but especially the publication of a long text with the proximity of the two States in the affairs of the World have undoubtedly constituted the diplomatic point of this Olympic day. “Even without Western boycott, Putin would have had this guest status, stresses Alexander Gabouyev, a specialist in Asia at the Carnegie de Moscow Center. The presence of Joe Biden would only have a slight problem of protocol …”
A long “joint declaration on the entry of international affairs in a new era” has been published. Beijing and Moscow feature convergent views of global governance, the need for a “multipolar” world, the “sovereign” management of the Internet or the “politicization” of COVID-19 or human rights. Russia and China also arise as defenders of “authentic democracy”.
Reciprocal supports
Beyond these declarations of principle that draw a political axis as much as strategic, the document is a charge against the United States and their “Cold War Approach”. In a kind of exchange of processes, each party displays its support to the other on its main concerns. The declaration thus said “opposed to any future enlargement of NATO”, echoing the diplomatic litigation which opposes Moscow and the Westerners on the background of military climbing around Ukraine. China reiterates its “support” to the Russian request to obtain “legal guarantees” for its security. For Beijing, NATO is only a balance of the cold war that has lost all legitimacy after the collapse of the Soviet Union and the Warsaw Covenant in 1991.
You have 68.54% of this article to read. The rest is reserved for subscribers.