#xi meets putin

[world-fresh-news]

China: Chinese Foreign Minister visits Russia during Xi Jinping and Putin's meeting, will participate in this meeting - Chinese Foreign Minister visits Russia during Xi Jinping's meeting and Putin will participate in this meeting

China: The Chinese Foreign Minister will visit Russia during the Xi Jinping-Putin meeting and will participate in this meeting China News Xi Jinping and Putin may meet in October. Amid the possibilities of a meeting between these two leaders, China’s top diplomat Wang Yi is preparing for a four-day visit to Russia on Monday. Regarding the visit, the Chinese Foreign Ministry said in a statement…

[molfarua]

Xi Jinping meets putin in kremlin.

У кремлі розпочалася зустріч Сі Цзіньпіна з путіним

[shaktiknowledgeblog]

Putin | Xi Jingping | ukraine russia news | russia news | vladimir putin russia ukraine war | meeting | moscow | beijing | America

Amidst war with Ukraine, Jinping will meet Putin on Monday, America infuriated, gave this threat Xi Jinping is visiting Russia from Monday, March 20 to March 22. He will hold important talks there with his Russian counterpart Vladimir Putin. During this, they can lobby for peace talks to end the war between Russia and Ukraine. Image Source: FILE Amidst war with Ukraine, Jinping will meet Putin on…

[niveditaabaidya]

Putin And Xi Jinping To Meet At Samarkand #russia #china #uzbek #samark...

[tomorrowusa]

It's not exactly news that Republicans are regurgitating Russian propaganda. The leader of the GOP is himself a Russian asset.

The new twist is that at least a few Republicans are starting to bring this up in public.

GOP Rep. Mike Turner said Sunday that Russian propaganda has taken hold among some of his House Republican colleagues and is even "being uttered on the House floor." "We see directly coming from Russia ... communications that are anti-Ukraine and pro-Russia messages, some of which we even hear being uttered on the House floor," Turner, chair of the House Permanent Select Committee on Intelligence, said in an interview on CNN's "State of the Union." "There are members of Congress today who still incorrectly say that this conflict between Russia and Ukraine is over NATO, which of course it is not," he added.

Yes, Republicans are spreading Russian propaganda on the floor of the House. And Rep. Turner is not the only one who has called this out.

His comments come on the heels of remarks House Foreign Affairs Committee Chair Michael McCaul made this week about how Russian propaganda has taken root among the GOP. McCaul, a Texas Republican, told Puck News that he thinks "Russian propaganda has made its way into the United States, unfortunately, and it’s infected a good chunk of my party’s base." Turner and McCaul each tied Russia and its leader, Vladimir Putin, to other authoritarian leaders, including President Xi Jinping of China and Kim Jong Un, the leader of North Korea. "[The propaganda] makes it more difficult for us to really see this as an authoritarian versus democracy battle, which is what it is," Turner told CNN, adding, "President Xi of China, Vladimir Putin himself have identified as such." McCaul described explaining to colleagues that the threat of Russian propaganda is similar to threats made by other U.S. adversaries. "I have to explain to them what’s at stake, why Ukraine is in our national security interest," he said. "By the way, you don’t like Communist China? Well, guess what? They’re aligned [with Russia], along with the ayatollah [of Iran]. So when you explain it that way, they kind of start understanding it."

It's all good of Michael McCaul and Mike Turner to call this out. But what are they doing to get badly needed aid to Ukraine? They need to show that they are more than just do-nothing passive observers.

Last week, Rep. Don Bacon said on NBC News' "Meet the Press" that he had commitments from Johnson and McCaul that they would allow a bipartisan Ukraine military aid package to advance to a vote. Rep. French Hill echoed this point on CBS' "Face the Nation" Sunday morning, saying he believes Johnson will bring Ukraine aid to the floor "immediately after completing the work on [the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act] and FISA's extension — that deadline of April 19 makes it a priority for the first few days we're back." "I believe he's fully committed to bringing it up to the floor immediately thereafter," Hill added. But Bacon, R-Neb., also warned that Johnson could face a vote to oust him from the speakership if he moves forward with Ukraine aid.

With a tiny majority and Marjorie Taylor Greene nipping at his heels, Speaker "MAGA Mike" Johnson is in a weak position. House members not wanting to make the US a vassal state of Vladimir Putin need to take advantage of this weakness.

If you live in the districts of these representatives, contact them and urge them to back uo their words with some action on aid for Ukraine.

Mike Turner (OH-10) Michael McCaul (TX-10) French Hill (AR-02) Don Bacon (NE-02)

[virtchandmoir]

Canadian Olympians push for opposition to Russians in Paris

March 8, 2023 

A group of 42 retired Canadian Olympians urged the Canadian Olympic Committee to reject the idea of allowing Russians to participate in next year’s Paris Games unless Russia withdraws from Ukraine.

“We condemn recent public statements issued by the COC supporting the ‘exploration of a pathway’ for Russians and Belarusians to compete as ‘neutrals’ in the 2024 Paris Olympics,” the Canadians wrote in a statement released Wednesday.

Opening that door, the athletes said, “sends a message that the COC is no longer concerned with Russia’s brutal invasion of Ukraine.”

Signing the statement was a who’s-who of Canadian Olympic greats and gold medalists, including Hayley Wickenheiser (hockey), Jenn Heil and Alex Bilodeau (freestyle skiing), Tessa Virtue (skating) and Beckie Scott (cross-country skiing).

Russian and Belarusian athletes have been largely excluded from international competition since Russia’s invasion of Ukraine last February. The International Olympic Committee seeks a pathway back for those athletes to compete without officially representing their countries, citing human-rights experts who argue the athletes should not be discriminated against solely because of their passports.

“Refusing their participation in international sport is not simply a matter of denying athletes a choice to compete because of their passport, it is a rejection of an unlawful and inhumane war and a recognition of the role international sports plays in geopolitics,” the Canadians wrote.

The COC has walked a fine line in staking out a position. Last month, secretary general David Shoemaker suggested athletes from the banned countries should be made to publicly speak out against the war to gain the neutral status they would need to participate.

Canada’s was also among a group of 35 governments that released a statement last month saying that, without clarity on a workable neutrality model, “we do not agree that Russian and Belarusian athletes should be allowed back into competition.”

Both the COC and the governments have stopped short of stating that Russians should not be allowed.

In their statement, the Canadian Olympians said a requirement for Russians to declare opposition to the war is “unfounded and out of touch.”

“For example, it is illegal in Russia to publicly denounce military actions abroad, and virtually impossible for high-profile athletes to oppose the war,” the statement said.

It also used instances in 2018 and 2021 when Russians could compete not under their country’s flag — but instead under the titles of “Olympic Athletes from Russia” and “Russian Olympic Committee” due to doping sanctions — as examples of how “separation of athlete from state is an impossible task.”

The letter also points out that the war began shortly after last year’s Winter Games in Beijing, which was highlighted by a high-profile meeting between Presidents Vladimir Putin and Xi Jinping before the opening ceremony.

“The Beijing 2022 Games helped set the stage for and dictated the timing of the initial invasion, sports facilities in Ukraine have been targeted by the Russian attacks, and Russian athletes have been elevated to high-ranking military positions and used in war propaganda,” the letter said.

It concluded that “no pathway should be considered” for Russians or Belarusians to compete in Paris until Russia “fully withdraws from Ukraine.”

—AP News

[thelostdreamsthings]

China has no desire for hegemony and will not wage either a cold or hot war against anyone. President Xi Jinping.

XiJinping: "Whatever stage of development it may reach, China will never pursue hegemony or expansion, and will never impose its will on others." Xinhua news reported

Xi Jinping is welcomed at the SF airport by Yellen and Newsom.

Behind all the smiles is a dagger. The next few years will be the most challenging period for China, US and the world.

So, Biden promised Xi Jinping “Five No’s”:

1️⃣ US does not seek a new Cold War.

2️⃣ Does not seek to change China’s system.

3️⃣ Does not seek to revitalize alliances against China.

4️⃣ Does not support “Taiwan independence”.

5️⃣ Has no intention to have a conflict with China.

But these are useless words, since the next U.S. president can/will overturn everything.

Don’t be fooled by Biden-Xi meeting.

In the 1990s, the US decided to expand NATO, fund Nazis in Ukraine, steal Crimea, and block Russia out of the Black Sea.

But all the while, they met with Putin countless times and smiled for the camera.

[theculturedmarxist]

The principal news items on Russian state television this evening were the reception Vladimir Putin was given by Chinese President Xi Jinping in Beijing and the succession of meetings that he had with other heads of state who are participating in the 10th anniversary celebrations of China’s Belt and Road Initiative.

You won’t find a word about the Russian President’s visit to Beijing in this evening’s online New York Times, but the paper’s editorial board is slow to post news about Putin, probably waiting for the State Department to suggest the proper ‘spin.’ However, The Financial Times online gives Putin ‘front page’ coverage in two articles: one is an overview of his scheduled meetings and the other focuses on his talks with one leader in particular, prime minister Viktor Orban of Hungary.

Let us stop for a moment to consider what the FT wants us to know about Putin in Beijing.  And after that we can come back to the Russian coverage, which not only casts a different light on what you read in FT but provides a good deal more factual information to take in.

                                                                 *****

In keeping with its regular propagandistic journalism, the FT cannot print an article about Putin without reminding its readers what a pariah he is, a man pursued by international courts, a man who is isolated and weak. The title itself already sets the tone: “Vladimir Putin visits Beijing for first time since Russia’s invasion of Ukraine.”

Yes, they concede in the first paragraph that he arrived in China “for a high-level meeting with Chinese leader Xi Jinping,” but then take the air out of that by saying it was the Kremlin which described Putin as the ‘main guest’ at the event, not their own reporter on the ground in Beijing.

Two lines down we read: “The Russian leader cut back his foreign travel after the war in Ukraine began and until last week had not left the country since a war crimes indictment from the International Criminal Court in March.”  We are reminded that Putin skipped the G20 meetings in Indonesia and in India in September.

Thus, almost half the article is spent telling us about where Putin has not traveled to and nothing about this visit to Beijing.

Moving on, the authors speak about how “Russia had become increasingly dependent on China as an economic lifeline” ever since the launch of its Special Military Operation and imposition of sanctions by the West. This is a quote from a former political adviser at the European parliament who is now with a university in Taiwan. The same expert completes the downgrading of Russia by explaining that it is the ‘junior partner’ in the relationship with China.

After kicking the tires of the Belt and Road Initiative in general for having to renegotiate or write off $79 billion in bad loans, the authors give us four lines at the end that actually contain some news, of which I quote two below:

“Putin met Hungary’s prime minister Viktor Orban and Vietnamese president Vo Van Thuong on Tuesday, ahead of further meetings with Thai, Mongolian and Laotian leaders.”

The space allotted to the close-up photo of Putin and Xi smiling complacently to one another at the head of the article is six times bigger than the actual news in the text of the article.

The separate article “Orban meets Putin in bid to ‘save everything possible’ in bilateral relations” might be said to be marginally better journalism though the same Max Seddon in Riga is a co-author of both. The editors have done their best to spoil everything by giving it the subtitle “European head is first western leader to meet Russian president since issue of war crimes warrant for his arrest.” Once again the big photo of Orban and Putin, clasping hands at their meeting, tells more than the text.

There are some of the same general reminders here of Putin’s alleged isolation and pariah status, but they are given more force by a quotation from the U.S. ambassador to Hungary condemning the meeting: “…Orban chooses to stand with a man whose forces are responsible for crimes against humanity in Ukraine…” 

The only neutral remarks in the article catalog the common business interests of Russia and Hungary, including natural gas supply and a nuclear power plant under construction by Rosatom.

                                                                 *****

Russian television news support the view that Putin is the main guest at the BRI gathering in Beijing by videos showing the entry of the participants to the state banquet this evening:  the procession is led by Putin and Xi side by side. Just behind them is Xi’s wife and Kazakhstan president Tokaev. The several dozen others follow behind.  Similarly in the video of all the leaders lined up for their group photo, Putin and Xi are together in the very center chatting to one another.  Questions anyone about who is who, and what is what?

Perhaps the Russians go overboard in stressing the great demand of other participants for one-on-one time with Putin at the large residence which the Chinese made available for holding these tête-à-têtes in discrete luxury. Pavel Zarubin, the host of the Sunday evening program Moskva, Kremlin, Putin is a master at showing off details like the line of limousines of leaders waiting outside for their time in the sun with Putin.

Aside from footage from the meeting with Orban, Russian television presented to viewers the public part of Putin’s meeting with the president of Laos, who opened the conversation speaking passable if heavily accented Russian. As we learned, he was studying at Leningrad University during the same years as Putin, though in a different department.  The Vietnamese president also made reference to studies in the Soviet Union in their opening remarks for the cameras.  His talks with Putin were likely about energy first of all since Gazprom is fairly active in the country. Gazprom chairman Alexei Miller is in the Russian delegation.  As for the meeting that Putin had with the interim president of Pakistan, who is an English speaker, we know that they discussed energy projects and deliveries of more than a million tons of Russian grain to Pakistan, presumably paid for in yuan. With the Mongolian president, Vesti tells us they discussed a new gas pipeline which apparently is intended to supply Mongolia itself and not only serve as a transit route to China.

However, from the Russian perspective these side meetings with other BRI Forum participants are small beer. What they are awaiting with great anticipation is the several hours tomorrow that Putin and Xi will spend one-on-one and then are joined by their respective delegations. We know that the situation in the Middle East is at the top of their agenda, with a secondary focus on the Ukraine war and remaining time devoted to further development of economic ties.

The one tantalizing tidbit that Russian news (Sixty Minutes) threw out to viewers is that whereas Putin returns to Moscow tomorrow evening, Foreign Minister Lavrov flies to North Korea for a meeting with Kim.

©Gilbert Doctorow, 2023

[molfarua]

❗ Xi Jinping at Vnukovo airport. putin did not come to meet the leader of China.

❗ Сі Цзіньпін в аеропорту "Внуково". путін зустрічати лідера Китаю не приїхав.

[workersolidarity]

🇨🇳🇷🇺 RUSSIAN PRESIDENT VLADIMIR PUTIN MEETS WITH CHINESE PRESIDENT XI JINPING AT THIRD BELT AND ROAD INITIATIVE FORUM

Russian President Vladimir Putin met with Chinese President Xi Jinping Wednesday for the third Belt and Road Forum for International Cooperation held in Beijing.

As the host country, Republic of China President Xi Jinping spoke first, thanking the Russian President and pointing to the implementation of the agreements and celebrating record trade between the two countries, which is approaching $200 Billion this year.

"Mr President, during the ten years since 2013, the two of us have held 42 meetings and established good business-like relations and a strong personal friendship" President Xi said.

"Mutual trust in our political relations is steadily growing. Close and effective strategic collaboration is being maintained. Bilateral trade has achieved historic records and is approaching the target of $200 billion we have set."

After the opening ceremony of the forum, President Xi Jinping introduced Russian President Vladimir Putin, who spoke at the Belt & Road Forum.

The Russian President thanked President Xi for his invitation and congratulated the Chinese President on the 74th Anniversary of the establishment of the People's Republic of China.

"Next year will be an anniversary year for both your country and the diplomatic relations between our countries. On October 2, 1949, the next day after the establishment of the PRC, the USSR was the first to recognise the new China" President Putin said to the Chinese President in his speech.

President Putin pointed to the Chinese President's visit in March, saying this was a special sign indicating the close "level and nature" of relations between the People's Republic of China and the Russian Federation.

"One and a half years after my last visit, all of us, our large delegation, are in Beijing again. We can see that the city is developing and prospering, and we are very glad for our Chinese friends," President Putin told the Chinese leader.

"Your idea of promoting wide-ranging cooperation between the countries of the historical Silk Road, which was put forward ten years ago, has gained momentum."

President Putin further told President Xi that although plans are being designed and implemented, the nations involved may be unsure how a project will turn out, however China, under the leadership of President Xi Jinping, is always highly successful in its endeavors, and he thanked the Chinese President for their collaboration, saying all parties gain from the arrangement.

President Putin went on to promote the initiatives of the Belt and Road programme, pointing to the Chinese President's ideas, which Putin described as intended to benefit the whole of mankind and wished the Chinese President success in this noble undertaking.

"Under the difficult present-day conditions, it is particularly relevant to maintain close foreign policy coordination, something we are doing now. Today, we will discuss all of this, including, and primarily, our bilateral relations."

President Putin finished by saying, "You have just mentioned our bar – our objective of reaching $200 billion in trade this year. If we look at the year-on-year figures – we analysed this yesterday evening – the 200-billion target was reached between this day a year ago and today, and this bar will certainly be exceeded by the end of the calendar year. Therefore, we are advancing very confidently on the bilateral plane as well."

The Russian President then thanked his Chinese counterpart before the official Forum began, after which the Russian President spoke at length about cooperation between the two powers.

During his remarks at the Forum, President Putin told the audience that the essence of the Belt and Road Initiative is to "promote creative and constructive interaction" throughout the international community.

"We pointed out on numerous occasions that Russia and China, just as the majority of other countries, share the striving for equal and mutually beneficial cooperation towards universal, sustainable and lasting economic progress and social welfare based on respect for the civilisational diversity and the right of every state to its own development model," President Putin said in his speech.

President Putin went on, "The Belt and Road initiative is based on these fundamental principles and fits in very well with the integration processes that are ongoing in many regions. It also corresponds to the Russian ideas of creating an integration contour that will ensure the freedom of trade, investment and employment and will be complemented with interconnected infrastructure."

President Putin said the Belt and Road programme meshes well with the Russian idea of creating greater Eurasian partnership, expanding cooperation and interaction between like-minded nations and the integration of multilateral organizations like the Shanghai Cooperation Organisation (SCO), the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN) and the Eurasian Economic Union (EAEU), which Russia is successfully developing with its post-Soviet partners.

President Putin further emphasized new agreements between the Russian Federation and the People's Republic of China on the development of the EAEU and Belt and Road programme, along with a non-preferential agreement on trade and economic cooperation between the EAEU and China. To this end, a joint commission was established to "align our efforts to implement this agreement."

"In February 2023, we adopted an expanded roadmap, which provides, in part, for the development of relations between the EAEU and China in trade policy and the digitisation of transport corridors," President Putin said.

The Russian leader further noted the importance of the initiatives, saying they were an, "integral part of Russia’s national development strategy, the strengthening of our economic, technological and financial sovereignty, as well as the modernisation and expansion of infrastructure."

The Russian President told audiences he believes the Belt and Road Initiatives were very important to participating countries and pointed to the expansive Russian territories for enhancing the connectivity between the Russian Federation and its partners.

The Russian President mentioned the various infrastructure projects being implemented through the Belt and Road, telling the audience that, taken together, the projects will allow participants to create an "integral transport and logistics network" and to "diversify freight traffic through more effective, reliable and safe" transportation.

"For example, we are building the North-South international corridor in European Russia, which President Xi has mentioned. It will connect Russian ports on the Baltic and Arctic seas to ports in the Persian Gulf and the Indian Ocean. Seamless rail connectivity, as professionals say, will be ensured throughout this route, from Murmansk in the north of Russia to Bandar Abbas in Iran," President Putin said.

"Another north-south transport artery will run via the Urals region and Siberia. Its main elements are the modernisation of the central part of the Trans-Siberian Railway, including the West-Siberian Railway line running across several regions of Siberia, namely the Omsk, Novosibirsk, Kemerovo and Tomsk regions and the Altai Territory. The other elements are the construction of the Northern Latitudinal Railway, as we call it, towards the ports on the Arctic Ocean and the Yamal Peninsula in the north of the Krasnoyarsk Territory, and a new North Siberian Railway from the Khanty-Mansi Autonomous Area towards our largest railway network comprising the Trans-Siberian Railway and Baikal-Amur Mainline."

After the initial speeches and meetings, President Xi Jinping of China and Russian President Vladimir Putin will meet on the sidelines to further discuss trade, economic cooperation, as well as the global and regional situation. The Russian delegation included a large number of senior officials, including the Vice Premier, representatives of the Foreign Ministry, Economic Development agencies, as well as representatives from the Transportation and Finance departments.

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@WorkerSolidarityNews

[ukrainenews]

Daily Wrap Up March 10-13, 2023

Under the cut:

Russia and the United Nations have agreed to a 60-day extension of the Ukraine grain deal after negotiations in Geneva, Russian state news agency RIA reported on Monday.

Fierce fighting rages over central Bakhmut as Russia’s Wagner mercenaries try to break through Ukrainian defenses in the ruined city, Colonel General Oleksandr Syrskyi said on March 13. Syrskyi, who commands Ukraine’s Ground Forces and made two known visits to Bakhmut in recent weeks, acknowledged that the situation in the embattled city remained difficult as Russia continued to press forward.

Ukrainian intelligence officials have officially confirmed the identity of the prisoner of war who shouted, "Glory to Ukraine!" before he was executed in a video that was widely circulated on social media. The Security Service of Ukraine (SBU) determined he was a sniper with the 163rd Battalion of the 119th Separate Tank Brigade of the Chernihiv Region, Oleksandr Ihorovych Matsiyevsky. CNN earlier reported that Matsiyevsky's loved ones and his commander had recognized him as the man in the clip.

Three civilians were killed in Russian shelling of Kherson in southern Ukraine on Saturday, and another died in Donetsk, regional officials said. Reuters reported the governor of Kherson oblast, Oleksandr Prokudin, as saying three people, including an elderly woman, had also been wounded.

Dozens of Ukrainian soldiers on Monday wrapped up a four-week training in Spain on how to operate the Leopard 2A4 battle tank, of which Madrid is set to deliver six mothballed units to Kyiv this spring. A total of 40 tank crew members and 15 mechanical specialists underwent training on their use at a military base in the northeastern city of Zaragoza, Spain’s armed forces said in a statement.

Chinese President Xi Jinping plans to travel to Russia to meet his counterpart Vladimir Putin as soon as next week, people familiar with the matter said, which would be sooner than previously expected. Plans for a visit come as China has been offering to broker peace in Ukraine, an effort that has been met with scepticism in the West given Beijing's diplomatic support for Russia.

“Russia and the United Nations have agreed to a 60-day extension of the Ukraine grain deal after negotiations in Geneva, Russian state news agency RIA reported on Monday.

"Our Russian interdepartmental delegation has just completed another round of talks with UN representatives led by UNCTAD Secretary General R. Greenspan and OCHA head M. Griffiths,” Russian Deputy Foreign Minister Sergei Vershinin said at a briefing on Monday, according to RIA.

The diplomat added Moscow had agreed to extend the current grain deal, which lasts until March 18, for an additional 60 days.

"But just for 60 days,” Vershinin said. “Any further grain policy will depend on actual —based on not what's said but what's done — progress on the normalization of our agricultural exports, including bank payments, transport logistics, insurance, unfreezing of financial activities and the continuation of ammonia supply through the Tolyatti-Odessa pipeline.”

Why are grain exports so important? Ukraine and Russia are both significant suppliers of food to the world. Before the war, Ukraine – known as one of the globe’s breadbaskets – would export around three-quarters of the grain it produces. According to data from the European Commission, about 90% of these exports were shipped by sea, from Ukraine’s Black Sea ports. The war and its impact on grain exports therefore has major implications, particularly in the global South which relies heavily on them.”-via CNN

~

“Fierce fighting rages over central Bakhmut as Russia’s Wagner mercenaries try to break through Ukrainian defenses in the ruined city, Colonel General Oleksandr Syrskyi said on March 13.

Syrskyi, who commands Ukraine’s Ground Forces and made two known visits to Bakhmut in recent weeks, acknowledged that the situation in the embattled city remained difficult as Russia continued to press forward.

The commander said that the Wagner members were storming into central Bakhmut from multiple fronts, but Ukraine still held on to the “fortress” while inflicting “significant losses” on the invading forces.

“All enemy attempts to capture the city are repelled by artillery, tanks, and other firepower," Syrskyi said, as quoted by the Ukrainian Defense Ministry's media center.

Syrskyi’s statement comes amid an eight-month-long battle over Bakhmut, a largely destroyed city nearly emptied of its 70,000 residents. Russia has intensified its offensive on Bakhmut in recent weeks as it captured neighboring settlements, inching its way into encircling the city.

Late on March 12, Wagner head Yevgeny Prigozhin said in a Telegram post that his mercenaries began storming into the underground compound of the Artemivskyi non-ferrous metal processing plant, also known as AZOM, in northern Bakhmut.

Neither Ukraine nor Russia officially commented on the situation at the plant on March 13.

The Institute for the Study of War (ISW), a D.C.-based think-tank analyzing the war in Ukraine, said on March 12 that the Russian military leadership could be trying to expend the Wagner forces and Prigozhin’s influence in Bakhmut.

The ISW has earlier reported that Wagner’s committed elite forces in Bakhmut may be running out as the paramilitary group uses up its manpower to maintain offensive momentum.

Serhiy Cherevatyi, a spokesperson for Ukraine's Eastern Military Command, said on March 11 that Ukraine seeks to degrade Wagner forces during its defense of Bakhmut.

He added that Ukraine has already “thinned out” the second formation of Wagner’s recruited prisoners over the winter, and Ukraine has “a real chance” of degrading Wagner if it keeps up the pace.

As fierce battles raged in the east and south of Ukraine, civilian casualties continued to be reported.

The President’s Office said on March 13 that Russian troops launched two missiles at a school in Avdiivka, Donetsk Oblast, killing a woman.

To the northeast, the Russians launched a missile strike on the village of Znob-Novhorodske in Sumy Oblast, killing at least one and wounding four, according to the President’s Office.

On the southern front, the Russians fired upon energy workers in a liberated area of Kherson Oblast, wounding one person, the regional military administration said.”-via Kyiv Independent

~

“Ukrainian intelligence officials have officially confirmed the identity of the prisoner of war who shouted, "Glory to Ukraine!" before he was executed in a video that was widely circulated on social media.

The Security Service of Ukraine (SBU) determined he was a sniper with the 163rd Battalion of the 119th Separate Tank Brigade of the Chernihiv Region, Oleksandr Ihorovych Matsiyevsky. CNN earlier reported that Matsiyevsky's loved ones and his commander had recognized him as the man in the clip.

The SBU came to the conclusion after communicating with the sniper's family and comrades-in-arms, as well as processing photo and video materials, officials said.

"This is a true Hero who, even looking into the face of death, demonstrated to the whole world what Ukrainian character and invincibility are," said SBU Head Vasyl Malyuk in a statement on their website. "It is these defenders who are defending our land today, which means that the enemy will definitely be defeated. Because Ukraine's Great Victory is made up of the heroic deeds of people like Oleksandr Matsiyevsky. Glory to the hero! Glory to the heroes! Glory to Ukraine!" Matsiyevsky was called for military service in March 2022. Since the end of December, he was reported missing near the village of Krasna Hora in the eastern Donetsk region, according to the SBU. The sniper was shot dead on December 30. His body was returned home in February.

The SBU said it is working to identify the Russian military personnel involved in the execution, and investigating the killing under Article 438 of the Criminal Code of Ukraine (violation of the laws and customs of war).

Officials in Kyiv, including President Volodymyr Zelensky, have roundly condemned the sniper's on-camera slaying as a war crime.”-via CNN

~

“Three civilians were killed in Russian shelling of Kherson in southern Ukraine on Saturday, and another died in Donetsk, regional officials said.

Reuters reported the governor of Kherson oblast, Oleksandr Prokudin, as saying three people, including an elderly woman, had also been wounded .

“Today the Russian occupiers have hit Kherson again, on Mykolayivsky road near a shop, debris from a shell killed three people,” he told Ukrainian TV.

Ukraine recaptured Kherson in November after nearly eight months of occupation by Russian forces who seized it soon after the start of their invasion. The area is now under almost constant bombardment from Russian forces on the opposite side of the Dnieper river.

The Donetsk regional governor, Pavlo Kyrylenko, said one person had been killed and at least three injured in the city of Kostyantynivka after several rounds of Russian shelling during the day.”-via The Guardian

~

“Dozens of Ukrainian soldiers on Monday wrapped up a four-week training in Spain on how to operate the Leopard 2A4 battle tank, of which Madrid is set to deliver six mothballed units to Kyiv this spring.

A total of 40 tank crew members and 15 mechanical specialists underwent training on their use at a military base in the northeastern city of Zaragoza, Spain’s armed forces said in a statement.

“It has been intense,” Spanish trainer Captain Contreras - who identified himself only by his rank and surname - told reporters, who were allowed access to the drills for the first time.

Contreras said the Ukrainians would be returning home “with a very acceptable knowledge” of the Leopards.

“Although the tanks were different, there were many systems that coincide and that has made things much easier. With that, together with the motivation that the personnel brought and their desire to learn, we see them very well prepared to resume combat.”

One of the Ukrainian soldiers being trained had a patch on a sleeve sporting the slogan “Freedom or Death” underneath the Ukrainian flag.”-via The Guardian

~

“Chinese President Xi Jinping plans to travel to Russia to meet his counterpart Vladimir Putin as soon as next week, people familiar with the matter said, which would be sooner than previously expected.

Plans for a visit come as China has been offering to broker peace in Ukraine, an effort that has been met with scepticism in the West given Beijing's diplomatic support for Russia.

Putin said last month that a Xi visit had been agreed, though the Kremlin chief gave no date for a possible visit. The Wall Street Journal reported last month that a visit to Moscow could take place in April or early May.

China's foreign ministry did not immediately respond to a request for comment on the possibility of Xi going to Moscow.

When asked about the Reuters report, the Kremlin said it had nothing to say on the matter.

"As a rule, announcements of official foreign visits are coordinated synchronously by mutual agreement of the parties," Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov told reporters in Moscow.

"When there is such readiness, we will let you know."

No other details were immediately available.

The sources briefed on the matter declined to be identified given the sensitivity of the issue.

Last month, Putin hosted China's top diplomat Wang Yi on a visit to Moscow. One source said that Wang's trip to Moscow was to help prepare for Xi's visit.

China and Russia struck a "no limits" partnership in February of 2022, when Putin was visiting Beijing for the opening of the Winter Olympics, weeks before Russia invaded Ukraine. The two sides have continued to reaffirm the strength of their ties.

Xi has met Putin in person 39 times since becoming president, most recently in September during a summit in central Asia.

On Monday, Xi wrapped up the annual session of China's parliament, the National People's Congress, during which he was unanimously confirmed in a precedent-breaking third term as president.”-via Reuters

[lepartidelamort]

Cocksucking Four-Eyed Faggot Johnson Condemns Russians and Chinese People as Evil, Demands Ukraine Money

By Andrew Anglin

Well, that didn’t take long.

RT:

In a dramatic break from his party’s hardline conservative base, US House Speaker Mike Johnson this week praised the country’s deep state, called Russia, China, and Iran an “axis of evil,” and vowed to put his job on the line to funnel more than $60 billion to Kiev. For months, Johnson has resisted bringing a $95 billion foreign aid bill to a vote, arguing that neither he nor his fellow Republicans could support the bill – which would give $14 billion in military aid to Israel and $60 billion to Ukraine – without it being tied to an overhaul of US border security. However, after a series of recent meetings with US intelligence chiefs, Johnson has changed his tune. “This is a critical time right now, a critical time on the world stage,” Johnson told reporters on Wednesday. “I think providing lethal aid to Ukraine right now is critically important. I really do. I really do believe the intel and the briefings that we’ve gotten.” “I believe [Chinese President] Xi [Jinping] and [Russian President] Vladimir Putin and Iran really are an axis of evil,” he continued. “I think they’re in coordination on this. I think that Vladimir Putin would continue to march through Europe if he were allowed.”

Oh, fuck you, faggot.

Ironically, the fact that these people keep saying that in order to justify attempting to destroy Russia actually justifies Russia marching through Europe.

What sort of adult says people are “evil”? What does that even mean?

Does he mean they are possessed by demons and/or worship Satan? What is an “evil person”?

In case anyone isn’t aware, let me tell you: this guy took this Speaker position from Kevin McCarthy on the promise of not funding the Ukraine. McCarthy was an extremist war shill, and was removed because he was out of control, just funding everything Brandon wanted.

Now, it turns out, Johnson is the exact same thing. This cocksucker came down from his Speaker seat to break a tie on an amendment to FISA which required the government to get a warrant before spying on people, voting in favor of no warrant.

Democracy is always tyranny. It doesn’t matter what you want. It doesn’t matter who you vote for. The people you vote for will just continue doing the things you don’t want. First they will lie to you, and try to convince you that you actually do want these things, and if that doesn’t work, they just do it anyway.

Neocon Jew David Frum coined the term “Axis of Evil” to describe a series of Islamic countries the US wanted wars with more than 20 years ago. Now here we are, yet again, with a completely unregulated government obsessed with wars for the Jews.

The Ukraine money doesn’t actually mean anything. It’s a long story that many people have already broken down in detail, so I won’t do it here, but the short story is that this is just a payout to people in Washington and to arms manufacturers. They don’t have the weapons to send.

“Funding Wars Good for the Economy”

The fact that they are actually saying “this is good for the military industrial complex and therefore the American economy” is still incredible. I heard this the first time a few months ago from some Jew promoting this bill, or maybe it was Mitch McConnell, and I was shocked. For the longest time, people would complain about US war projects and say “this is just a payout to the military industrial complex,” and now the government just says “yeah, you’re right – and that’s good!”

Biden just made a statement about the bill, saying it is going to build American jobs manufacturing weapons. I don’t think it will actually do that, but even if it did, how is “we should fight wars to help our economy” something that is justifiable?

War is horrible. Look at the videos from Gaza and the Ukraine. This is a nightmare. People should not be promoting war. It is psychopathic to have a national policy that says “we need more wars because it’s good for our economy.” It’s not good for the economy. There is some weird myth about how World War II ended the Great Depression. Insofar as that is true, it’s because the entire economy was shut down and turned into a war machine.

There is no specific profit for a nation in fighting wars. Especially not in the current year. Living space is not an issue because people are willing to live in midrise condos. Furthermore, global trade makes stealing people’s resources pointless, especially in light of how expensive modern war machines are. Faggots used to say that the war with Iraq was “about oil,” which is so retarded it makes your skull numb to try and think about it. Saddam was selling oil very cheap. US spent trillions of dollars fighting a war against Iraq – orders of magnitude more than they could ever spend on Iraqi oil (and then didn’t even keep control of the oil fields anyway).

Chinese people are obsessed with money, and they are also obsessed with avoiding wars. It’s because wars are bad for business. Look at the difference between China’s economic growth and US economic growth over the last 50 years. It’s a ridiculous thought to even compare the two.

The reason the US wants wars is that they can’t think of anything else. Yes, the US has a very powerful “economy,” but it is an absurd monstrosity that is not capable of real world honest competition. The US has to maintain the position of global military superpower, or the dollar fails and the US economy and therefore the state fails. The only way to do that is through war.

The Trump 2016 platform was an actual plan to shift the US into a mode of actually being competitive economically and ending the wars. That could have worked back then. It wouldn’t work now. Now, America is very doomed, and their only remaining idea is to light the whole world on fire and hope their enemies are the ones who suffer the worst burns.

All of these government people are morons and lunatics and they all belong in jail.

[tomorrowusa]

The EU is considering whether it is a good idea to be the friend of a friend of a war criminal.

'Pandora’s box': EU weighs changing relations with China

If Xi Jinping chooses to "befriend a war criminal, it is our duty to get very serious about China," Lithuania's foreign minister, Gabrielius Landsbergis, told DW when asked what he thought about the Chinese president's three-day visit to Moscow and his meeting with his Russian counterpart Vladimir Putin.

The International Criminal Court issued a warrant for Putin late last week, accusing him of war crimes.

The only way forward for the European Union now, Landsbergis said, is to take "first steps on de-risking and eventual decoupling from China. The sooner we start, the better for the union."

[ ... ]

China has been supporting Russia's war efforts, however, in several indirect ways. This includes the ramping up of economic exchanges and exports of dual-use equipment, said Grzegorz Stec, an analyst at the Brussels office of the Mercator Institute for China Studies, a German foundation.

Among the equipment exports are "tires, trucks, clothing and other goods that can be used by the Russian military, although those are not specifically weapons," he told DW.

If the West were to find tangible proof of China providing large-scale military equipment to Russia, Stec pointed out, that would be "a red line" for the Europeans. But he recommended taking a cautious approach before accusing China of supplying weapons to Russia, given the magnitude of the potential geopolitical implications.

The perceived Chinese tilt towards Russia has not done it much good in Europe.

Regardless of this reluctance, Europe's attitude towards China is more skeptical than it has been in decades, said Reinhard Bütikofer, chair of the European Parliament's China delegation.

"The Chinese haven't been very successful in dealing with the Europeans lately," he told DW. "I would say they have squandered a lot of the political capital that they used to have."

[ ... ]

"The Chinese are trying to balance two incompatible goals. Being best buddies with Putin and being good friends of the Europeans at the same time," Bütikofer said. He made clear he doesn't think they can achieve both."As Abraham Lincoln said, you can fool some of the people all of the time or all the people some of the time. But you cannot fool all the people all the time." In concrete political terms, he explained, this meant that they would "fail if they insist on their no-limits friendship with the Russians."

In 1949, as he was laying the groundwork for the establishment of The People’s Republic of China, Chairman Mao Zedong declared, "The Chinese people have stood up!" The brutal invasion of Ukraine has finally made Europe stand up to Russia’s neocolonialist revanchism.

China will do better if it understands that a significant shift in thinking has taken place in Europe. The days of playing footsie with Putin and of accommodating Russian oligarchs in European democracies are gone.

[dreaminginthedeepsouth]

LETTERS FROM AN AMERICAN

November 16, 2023

HEATHER COX RICHARDSON

NOV 17, 2023

The summit of the leaders of the Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation (APEC) economies continued today in San Francisco, California. 

Formed in 1989, APEC is made up of the economies of 21 nations around the Pacific Rim: Australia, Brunei, Canada, Indonesia, Japan, South Korea, Malaysia, New Zealand, Philippines, Singapore, Thailand, Taiwan, Hong Kong, China, Mexico, Papua New Guinea, Chile, Peru, Russia, Vietnam, and the United States. Together, these economies make up about 62% of global gross domestic product and almost half of global trade.

David Sanger of the New York Times today noted an apparent shift in the power dynamic between President Joe Biden and Chinese president Xi Jinping, who met yesterday for a four-hour conversation. Earlier in his presidency, Xi was riding on a strong economy that overshadowed that of the U.S. and looked as if it would continue to do so. Then, Xi favored what was known as “wolf warrior” diplomacy: the aggressive defense of China’s national interests against what Chinese envoys portrayed as foreign hostility, especially that of the U.S. 

Under that diplomatic regime, Xi emphasized that liberal democracy was too weak to face the twenty-first century. The speed and momentous questions of the new era called for strong leaders, he said. In early February 2022, Russia and China held a summit after which they pledged that the “[f]riendship between the two States has no limits.” 

Things have changed. 

The U.S. has emerged from the coronavirus pandemic with a historically strong economy, while China’s economy is reeling from a real estate bubble and deflation at the same time that government crackdowns have made foreign capital flee. This summer, Xi quietly sidelined Qin Gang, the foreign minister associated with wolf warrior diplomacy, and in October, he replaced Defense Minister General Li Shangfu, who is under U.S. sanctions for overseeing weapon purchases from Russia. 

Indeed, China has also been quietly pushing back from its close embrace of Russia. Just weeks after their February 2022 declaration, Russia invaded Ukraine in an operation that Russian president Vladimir Putin almost certainly expected would be quick and successful, permitting Russia to seize key Ukrainian ports and land. Such a victory would have strengthened both Russia and China at the same time it weakened Europe, the United States, and their allies and partners. 

Instead, Ukraine stood firm, and the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO) and allies and partners have stood behind the embattled country. As the war has stretched on, sanctions have cut into the Russian economy and Putin has had to cede power to Xi, accepting the Chinese yuan in exchange for Russian commodities, for example. This week, Alberto Nardelli of Bloomberg reported that the European Union is considering another round of sanctions, including a ban on the export of machine tools and machinery parts that enable Russia to make ammunition. 

In a piece at the Center for European Policy Analysis today, Julia Davis, who monitors Russian media, noted that Russia lost an extraordinary 997,000 people between October 2020 and September 2021, even before the war began. Now it is so desperate to increase its population that its leadership claims to have stolen as many as 700,000 Ukrainian children and is urging women to have as many children as possible.  

Holly Ellyatt of CNBC noted that to the degree they even mentioned it, Russian media sniped at the Biden-Xi summit, but it was hard to miss that although Russian president Putin was not welcome to attend, Xi came and engaged in several high-level meetings, assuring potential investors that China wants to be friends with the U.S. Also hard to miss was Xi’s pointed comment that the China-U.S. relationship “is the most important bilateral relationship in the world.” 

Going into this summit, then, the U.S. had the leverage to get agreements from China to crack down on the precursor chemicals that Chinese producers have been shipping to Latin America to make illegal fentanyl, restore military communications between the two countries now that Li has been replaced, and make promises about addressing climate change. Other large issues of trade and the independence of Taiwan will not be resolved so easily. 

Still, it was a high point for President Biden, whose economic policies and careful investment in diplomatic alliances have helped to shift the power dynamic between the U.S. and two countries that were key geopolitical rivals when he took office. Now, both the U.S. and China appear to be making an effort to move forward on better terms. Indeed, Chinese media has shifted its tone about the U.S. and the APEC summit so quickly readers have expressed surprise. 

Today, Biden emphasized “the unlimited potential of our partnerships…to realize a future that will benefit people not only in the Asia-Pacific region but the whole world,… [a] future where our prosperity is shared and is inclusive, where workers are empowered and their rights are respected, where our economies are sustainable and resilient.” 

Biden and administration officials noted that companies from across the Asia-Pacific world have invested nearly $200 billion in the U.S. since Biden took office, creating tens of thousands of good jobs, while the U.S. has elevated its engagement with the region, holding bilateral talks, creating new initiatives and deepening economic partnerships. 

Today, Biden and Commerce Secretary Gina Raimondo announced that the Indo-Pacific Economic Framework, an economic forum established last year as a nonbinding replacement for the Trans-Pacific Partnership former president Trump abruptly pulled out of, had agreed on terms to set up an early warning system for disruptions to supply chains, cooperation on clean energy, and fighting corruption and tax evasion.

In a very different event in San Francisco today, a federal jury convicted David DePape, 43, of attempted kidnapping and assault on account of a federal official’s performance of official duties for his attack on former House Speaker Nancy Pelosi’s husband Paul with a hammer on October 28 of last year, fracturing his skull. 

DePape’s lawyers did not contest the extensive evidence against him but tried to convince the jury that DePape did not commit a federal crime because he did not attack Pelosi on account of Representative Pelosi’s official position. Instead, they said, DePape had embraced the language of right-wing lawmakers and pundits and believed in a conspiracy theory that pedophile elites had taken over the country and were spreading lies about former president Donald Trump. 

DePape told jurors he had come to conspiracy theories through Gamergate, a 2014–2015 misogynistic online campaign of harassment against women in the video game industry, which turned into attacks on feminism, diversity, and progressive ideas. Trump ally Steve Bannon talked of pulling together the Gamergate participants behind Trump and his politics. 

Also today, a subcommittee of the House Ethics Committee set up to investigate allegations against Representative George Santos (R-NY) issued its report. The Republican-dominated committee found that Santos had lied about his background during his campaign and, furthermore, that he appears to be a serial liar. Those lies also “include numerous misrepresentations to the government and the public about his and his campaign’s financial activities.” 

That is, the committee found, Santos defrauded his campaign donors, falsified his financial records, and used campaign money on beauty products, rent, luxury items from Hermes and Ferragamo, and purchases at the website Only Fans. The subcommittee recommended the Ethics Committee refer Santos to the Department of Justice, and “publicly condemn Representative Santos, whose conduct [is] beneath the dignity of the office” and who has “brought severe discredit upon the House.” 

Santos says he will not run for reelection.

—

LETTERS FROM AN AMERICAN

HEATHER COX RICHARDSON

[xtruss]

Chinaphobia: If China Arms Russia, the U.S. Should Kill China’s Aircraft Industry😂😂😂

Beijing’s aerospace future is uniquely dependent on Western companies. U.S. and EU trade sanctions could bring its indigenous aviation sector to a halt.

— Foreign Policy | By Richard Aboulafia | March 20, 2023

A COMAC C919 narrow-body airliner on display during the 2021 China Aviation Industry Conference And Nanchang Air Show on October 30, 2021 in Nanchang, China. Li Tong/VCG Via Getty Images

As Chinese President Xi Jinping meets in Moscow with Russian President Vladimir Putin this week, the war in Ukraine will be high on the agenda. While the Chinese leader might pressure Russia to pursue a peace deal, there are also worries in Western capitals that the authoritarian allies could agree to work together more closely.

A Chinese decision to provide Russia with weapons would change the world. Only China has the stockpiles and industrial capacity to replace Russia’s ruinous equipment losses in its war against Ukraine. Worse, it would help cement a Russia–China alliance, one pitted against Western interests. U.S. President Joe Biden and other Western leaders have warned China’s leadership that providing lethal technologies to Russia, on top of the non-lethal aid already provided, would have serious consequences.

Indeed, the West does have some leverage. One option would be to bring China’s commercial aircraft industry to a halt, thereby striking a blow against Beijing’s economic, technological, and transport aspirations. It would be a major blow to Xi’s prestige, too, since he has made technological self-sufficiency a key priority for the country.

The aviation industry is not just a matter of pride; it is foundational to China’s infrastructure and an essential mode of transport for many middle-class Chinese. According to the World Bank, passenger air traffic in China grew more than tenfold between 2000 and the 2019 peak, from 62 million passengers to 660 million passengers.

The exponential growth in passenger numbers has made China a major customer for Western-made jets: based on manufacturer-reported numbers, in 2000, China took 2 percent of world jetliner production. In 2018, the peak year for imports, it took 23 percent of world jetliner production.

The United States and its allies have already decided to decouple from China when it comes to semiconductors and telecommunications systems. Jetliner manufacturing would be a logical next step. After all, China’s vaunted commercial transports—the MA700 regional turboprop transport, ARJ21 regional jet, C919 narrow-body passenger plane, and proposed CR929 wide-body are heavily dependent upon imported Western technologies and systems.

While China wants to develop home-grown substitutes for these imported components, ultimately creating purely Chinese jets, this will be a very long road. Besides, modern jet producers rely on purchases of best-in-class technologies from a globalized industry; autarky is a very bad way to run a jetliner industry. Even the U.S. jetliner industry has long been wedded to industrial partners in Canada, France, Japan, the U.K., and many other countries.

“Engines are the Weakest Link in China’s Civil Aviation Plans.”

Engines are the weakest link in China’s civil aviation plans. Airframes and aircraft systems and technologies may be difficult to develop, but jet engines are at a completely different level in terms of barriers to entry. In fact, only three companies, located in two countries (General Electric (GE) and Raytheon/Pratt & Whitney in the United States and Rolls-Royce in the U.K.) build commercial jet engines. France’s Safran plays a role as a partner to GE in the CFM joint venture, but otherwise there are no other sourcing options.

Russia could not become a jet engine supplier option for China. The Soviet Union had a second-rate commercial engine industry for mostly domestic applications, but Russia’s efforts to revive it have been uncertain and very slow. Today, Russia remains completely dependent on Western aircraft and engines; it has only been able to keep its existing aircraft flying by illegally evading sanctions.

Only tiny numbers of obsolete Russian models have been manufactured over the last few decades. There are plans for new engines, but international sanctions, massive corruption, and the brain drain of the last year have likely doomed whatever chances Russia’s commercial aviation engine industry once had. Besides, the priority is now military systems.

As a consequence of the limited number of jet engine suppliers, the Commercial Aircraft Corporation of China’s (COMAC) ARJ21 regional jet and C919 are both powered by GE or GE/Safran engines, imported from the United States. For the ARJ21, there is no backup plan to GE’s CF34 engine.

For the C919, China is developing its CJ-1000A engine as an alternative to the GE/Safran Leap-1C, but it won’t enter service until the end of the decade. And the CJ-1000A is also heavily dependent upon key imported Western technologies. Like China’s jetliners, China’s first attempt at a commercial engine could easily be shut down with technology embargoes.

Killing the current CJ-1000 project would bring China back to the jet engine drawing board. Predictably, the Chinese government has been trying to develop its own engine industry independent of imported components, a process involving intellectual property theft and other desperate measures.

But again, the track record of commercial jet engine development outside the United States and U.K. is not encouraging. And as with aircraft, the big three engine suppliers would never think of building engines without relying on suppliers outside their home countries.

With or without Western sanctions, a best-case scenario for China’s aerospace aspirations is a second-rate, home-grown engine available in the mid 2030s. These would power Chinese jetliners which, relative to Western models, would offer lower reliability, higher fuel burn and operating costs, and uncertain product support.

The legal structure for jetliner decoupling is already in place. COMAC’s key parent companies are on the U.S. Military End User (MEU) List, which essentially prohibits technology exports to entities that “represent an unacceptable risk of use in or diversion to a ‘military end use’” in China and other countries.

The MEU List’s application to aerospace exports to China is somewhat opaque, perhaps deliberately. All of China’s thousands of Western jets use U.S. technology. While its parent companies are on the MEU List, COMAC itself is not. But clarifying the situation, by putting COMAC directly on the MEU List, would be a very simple—and economically devastating—move.

China’s MA700 aircraft provides a useful example of how jetliner decoupling would unfold. In September 2021, Canada—in conjunction with the United States—suddenly denied export licenses for the Pratt & Whitney Canada PW150 engine used on this 70-seat airliner. This meant that China’s national 70-seat regional turboprop transport, in development since 2007, was dead in its tracks.

Since then, the MA700 has effectively been airbrushed out of China’s aviation plans, like a disgraced Politburo member erased from Soviet documents. A prototype might have flown sometime last year, possibly with a few engines that had already been imported, but right now this aircraft has no future without access to new production engines.

“Jetliner decoupling, For the Most Part, Would Only Hurt China’s Aviation Industry, Not the West’s.”

A Western decision to starve COMAC of the components needed for its larger jetliners would be deeply embarrassing for China. China’s efforts to build a commercial aviation industry have had little success since they began in the 1970s with the failed Y-10 program.

But since COMAC’s ARJ21 program began in 2002, the government has devoted prodigious resources to the industry’s development. Sash Tusa, an aerospace and defense analyst at Agency Partners, estimated that China had spent at least $67 billion on its jetliner programs over the last 20 years. Tens of thousands of workers are employed in an industry that has figuratively and literally failed to get off the ground.

Killing these programs would represent more than just billions in sunk costs (and probably unemployed workers). It would also mean that China would have no choice but to keep importing Western jets from Airbus and Boeing. The Russian jetliner industry, long dormant but seeking revival, has been hobbled by sanctions and corruption, and doesn’t appear able to build jetliners for internal use, let alone export.

And it isn’t as though China can directly retaliate. Chinese industry plays a negligible role in Western jet-makers’ supply chains (although it does play a more significant role in maintenance, repair, and overhaul work; and in global jetliner finance). Jetliner decoupling, for the most part, would only hurt China’s aviation industry, not the West’s.

Therefore, Chinese officials would face a day of reckoning. The autarkic Made in China 2025 policies espoused by Xi would be exposed as extremely limited, or even a complete fantasy. China would have a simple choice: rethink selling weapons to Russia or admit that plans for a self-reliant national aviation industry are untenable, at least for the next 12 to 15 years.

Of course, if China then doubles down on arming Russia, there would also be the option of sanctioning China’s existing jetliner fleet, which is almost completely Western-made and therefore dependent on a steady stream of spare parts. Chinese aviation’s rapid growth would be replaced with steady capacity decline.

The loss of this key growth market would be very bad news for the entire global aviation industry, but it would also gravely damage China’s economy. An unreliable air transport system, impaired by sanctions, would mean that China, like Russia, would wind up like Iran—dependent on an aging fleet of existing jets, with highly uncertain levels of sustainability and safety.

Aviation decoupling between the West and China is neither inevitable nor desirable. However, the prospect of Russia rearming itself with Chinese weapons, and the two countries allied together against open societies, is worse. The threat of crippling China’s jetliner industry would be a strong weapon for preventing that outcome.

— Richard Aboulafia Is Another Chinaphobic Idiot managing director at AeroDynamic Advisory, an aerospace and defense industry management consultancy. He has followed the industry as an analyst and consultant since 1988.

[beardedmrbean]

International Criminal Court judges should “watch the skies,” according to a top Kremlin official who threatened a violent response to the arrest warrant issued against Russian President Vladimir Putin.

"I’m afraid, gentlemen, everyone is answerable to God and missiles,” Russian Security Council Deputy Chairman Dmitry Medvedev, who held the title of Russian presidency under Putin from 2008 to 2012, said on Monday. “It’s quite possible to imagine how a hypersonic Oniks fired from a Russian warship in the North Sea strikes the court building in The Hague. It can’t be shot down, I’m afraid.”

XI ARRIVES IN MOSCOW FOR MEETING WITH PUTIN

ICC officials issued an arrest warrant for Putin and another Russian official last week, one day after United Nations investigators accused Moscow of perpetrating “a war crime” against Ukrainian children deported into Russia. Kremlin officials dismissed the warrant as “null and void,” but Medvedev added his own provocative touch.

“And the court is just a pathetic international organization, not the people of a NATO country,” Medvedev said, per state media. “So, they won’t start a war. They’ll be scared. And no one will be sorry.”

The former Russian president issued that retort on the same day that Chinese President Xi Jinping arrived in Moscow. Xi and Putin will discuss how the two countries “can jointly promote strategic coordination and practical cooperation” and “practice true multilateralism” together, in the words of a Chinese diplomat who opened his press briefing with a rebuke of the ICC.

“The ICC needs to take an objective and just position, respect the jurisdictional immunity of a head of state under international law, prudently exercise its mandate in accordance with the law, interpret and apply international law in good faith, and not engage in politicization or using double standards,” Chinese Foreign Ministry spokesman Wang Wenbin said.

Xi embarked on his visit to Moscow just weeks after unveiling a “peace proposal” that calls for a ceasefire and the lifting of Western sanctions on Russia but does not urge Putin to withdraw his forces from Ukraine. Xi has prioritized ties with Putin as both leaders seek to challenge the U.S.-led alliance network in the vicinity of their historic empires. The Chinese leader’s trip to Moscow bookends a visit from Putin to Beijing last year, when they issued a statement calling for a "transformation of the global governance architecture and world order” — just weeks before Putin launched his attempt to overthrow the Ukrainian government.

"Ukraine is closely following the visit of the President of the People's Republic of China to Russia,” Ukrainian foreign ministry spokesman Oleg Nikolenko said Monday. “We expect that Beijing will use its influence on Moscow to force it to stop its aggressive war against Ukraine.”

Neither China, Russia, nor the United States has signed the treaty that established the ICC, but Ukraine’s parliament issued a call Monday for the treaty signatories “to take all possible measures” to haul Putin before the court.

“The crimes are carried out on the direct orders of the senior political and military leadership of the Russian Federation and constitute a gross violation of the current norms of international law, which requires a decisive and effective response from the international community by bringing the Russian leadership to international criminal liability,” the parliamentary resolution said.

Medvedev condemned the ICC for daring to issue a warrant against “the president ... of a nuclear power that isn’t party to the ICC for the same reasons as the U.S. and some other countries,” and argued that the warrant will lead to a “collapse” of international law.

“The consequences for international law will be disastrous,” he insisted. “No one now will be turning to international institutions. Everyone will be making agreements between themselves. All the foolish decisions of the U.N. and other organizations will be bursting at the seams. A dark decline of the entire system of international relations is coming.”