Russian President Vladimir Putin, in an interview published early on Wednesday, said he backed China’s plan for a peaceful settlement of the Ukraine crisis, saying Beijing had a full understanding of what lay behind the crisis.
China’s plan and further “principles” made public by President Xi Jinping last month took account of factors behind the conflict, Putin said.
“We are positive in our assessment of China’s approach to solving the Ukrainian crisis,” Putin said, according to a Russian-language transcript on the Kremlin website. “In Beijing, they truly understand its root causes and its global geopolitical meaning.”
And the additional principles, set down by Xi in talks with German Chancellor Olaf Scholz, were “realistic and constructive steps” that “develop the idea of the necessity to overcome the cold war mentality”.
Beijing put forward a 12-point paper more than a year ago that set out general principles for ending the war, but did not get into specifics.
It received a lukewarm reception at the time in both Russia and Ukraine, while the U.S. said China was presenting itself as a peacemaker but reflecting Russia’s “false narrative” and failing to condemn its invasion.
Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov last month called the proposal a “reasonable plan that the great Chinese civilization proposed for discussion.”
Xi’s additional principles call for a “cooling down” of the situation, conditions for restoring peace and creating stability and minimising the impacts on the world economy.
Russia views the conflict as a struggle pitting it against the “collective West” which took no account of Moscow’s security concerns by promoting the eastward expansion of NATO and military activity close to its borders.