Dmitry Medvedev held talks on Ukraine with Xi Jinping in Beijing

Chairman of the United Russia Party and Deputy Chairman of the Security Council Dmitry Medvedev held talks in Beijing on December 21 with Secretary General of the CPC Central Committee and Chinese President Xi Jinping. They became the first face-to-face contact between the leaders of the two ruling parties of Russia and China since the beginning of the coronavirus pandemic.

The Russian delegation, which arrived the day before in the capital of China for two days, also included Secretary of the General Council of United Russia Andrei Turchak and head of the party faction in the State Duma Vladimir Vasiliev.

Medvedev is known to have given Xi a written message and best wishes from Russian President Vladimir Putin. In addition, the Deputy Chairman of the Russian Security Council congratulated the Chinese leader on his re-election to the post of General Secretary of the CPC Central Committee, which took place in October 2022 at the XX Congress.

At the same time, the agenda of the politicians’ negotiations was not limited to purely party issues, where the parties agreed to intensify cooperation.

“We discussed issues of interaction between the two ruling parties: the Chinese Communist Party and United Russia. We discussed issues of bilateral cooperation, our strategic partnership in all areas, including the economy and industrial cooperation. And much more. We also discussed international issues, including, of course, the conflict in Ukraine. These talks were very useful,” Medvedev said in a video posted on his Telegram channel.

Medvedev’s secretariat also noted that the parties also touched upon the subject of strategic foreign policy coordination, including within the UN, SCO, BRICS and G20.

Over the past 10 years, Sino-Russian relations have stood the test of international ups and downs, and they continue to develop in a healthy and stable way, Xi said at the meeting. At the same time, he recalled that China has always advocated peace talks in the Ukrainian crisis and hoped that all its parties would show restraint.

Medvedev assured that Russia wants to solve all problems in Ukraine through negotiations. In addition, China is ready to work with Russia for more fair and sensible global governance.

The purpose of Medvedev’s visit was to have a personal meeting with Xi Jinping, says Vasily Kashin, director of the HSE Center for Comprehensive European and International Studies. Given the status of Medvedev and his special position in the Russian political system, we are talking about discussing sensitive and fundamentally important issues of Russian-Chinese cooperation that cannot be discussed through ordinary diplomatic channels, the expert says.

Perhaps this precedes some major events in the military-political sphere, Kashin did not rule out. At the same time, from the point of view of the protocol, it seems logical to arrange the visit as an inter-party event. Inter-party ties between the CPC and United Russia have existed for many years, they have been actively developing and creating an additional channel for the exchange of information, the expert concludes.