Putin, Xi Deeping Strategic Partnership as Ukraine war drags on

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Russian President Vladimir Putin called on Moscow and Beijing to deepen their strategic ties, when he spoke with Chinese President Xi Jinping via video call.

Putin praised Xi for providing plans to expand the “comprehensive partnership and strategic cooperation” between Russia and China, strengthening a geopolitical alliance that seeks to weaken Western hegemony.

In a video released through the Kremlin of the conversation, Putin said: “I agree with you that cooperation between Moscow and Beijing is based on a wide network of national interests and a convergence of perspectives on what relations between them should be. the wonderful powers.

“We build our ties on the basis of friendship, mutual acceptance and support, equality and mutual benefit. These ties are self-sustaining, independent of national political points and the existing global situation. “

Foreign policies in Moscow and Beijing play a stabilizing role in foreign affairs, Putin added.

Both autocrats have tried for a long time to present to the West as a country in decline, while China continues to represent the greatest economic risk for the United States and continues the Putin’s wear war against the Ukrainian forces supplied by the West.

While the war has been arriving for 3 years and a new era opens with Donald Trump’s access to the White House, Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky suggested European leaders to identify themselves as hard global actors.

“All European countries must be willing to spend as much on security as is truly needed, not just as much as they have gotten used to during years of neglect,” he told world leaders at the World Economic Forum in Davos on Tuesday. “If it takes 5 per cent of GDP to cover defense then so be it, 5 percent it is.”

Defense spending is not necessarily compensated for the expense of physical care or pensions, he added, saying that “it is not fair. “

In his speech, for which he won enthusiastic applause, Mr. Zelensky also warned that Putin would return to Europe with an army ten times larger than the one that invaded Ukraine in 2022, if a long-term diplomatic solution comes with “solid security guarantees. “

kyiv has greater regularity in its long-range movements in Russia in its attempt to strengthen infrastructure and military facilities.

Ukrainian forces struck a Russian aviation plant on Tuesday in the Smolensk region and an oil depot in the Voronezh region, targeting the Ukrainian military.

Voronezh’s Liskinskaya oil depot was struck for the second time in the past week, after a Ukrainian strike on January 16 hit fuel and lubricant tanks and started a fire at the Rosneft-run facility, Kyiv’s General Staff said.

The Russian Defense Ministry said it had intercepted Ukrainian drones on Tuesday during a large-scale night attack, 10 over the Smolensk region and six over the Voronej region. Ukraine claims to have shot 72 of the 131 drones that passed through Russia overnight.

Meanwhile, a senior German official warned on Monday that Russia is rearming more temporarily than in the previous idea and is possibly preparing to attack a NATO country.

“The Russian armed forces are not only compensating for the huge losses of personnel and equipment, but they are effectively roost,” said Gen Freuding’s Maj.

Even though Putin isn’t necessarily making plans to attack a NATO state, Gen. Freuding said he’s “clearly creating the situations for that. “The head of Germany’s Army Task Force in Ukraine noted that production and materials are expanding in Russia, with Iran and North Korea helping to fill its arsen with widely used missiles, drones and tanks.

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