putin's first official visit to china after his inauguration, he came to strengthen his friendship with sidzenpin and talk about the war in ukraine. so, let's figure out what was agreed upon. on today's episode of the bbc, i'm olga palomaryuk. putin came to china to negotiate and unite against the west. as observers say, the main thing that unites the leaders of russia and china is not love for the west, but their attitudes are different. putin arrived in beijing the night before and not alone, a large delegation came with him, the new minister of defense bilousov, his predecessor shuigu, minister of foreign affairs lavrov and six other vice prime ministers, all key. three parts of the administration, two

dozen governors, heads of state banks and state companies. there are many planned events, both public and private. well, during the conversation , xi jinping said that he has met with putin more than 40 times, which is twice as many as with any other world leader. in particular, putin visited beijing before the full-scale invasion, when they signed a declaration of friendship without borders. well, it is interesting that before how to meet with putin this time... pin traveled to europe, met, in particular, with french president macron and talked about the war in ukraine. so, how did the current meeting between the chinese and russian leaders take place? the bbc's beijing correspondent steve mcdonald is following the visit. this trip gives putin moral support. he is isolated in the international arena, he cannot go to many countries, for fear that he will be arrested and sent to the international criminal court. here he received a magnificent reception and has.

an ordinary international leader, and not international exile, is holding meetings with xijin ping, and i will read some of their quotes. putin said that our cooperation in world affairs is one of the main stabilizing factors in the international arena. together we defend the principles of justice and a democratic world order based on international law. many in ukraine will find it laughable that putin... says this while invading another country, but here it is taken seriously, reported in the chinese press, and xijin pin replies that their two countries support justice in the world. again, i think many find it hard to believe that these leaders are promoting this in the first place. china's visit to china is important to putin for many reasons, and not just because it is one of the few countries where he is warmly received. "

now the russian economy depends more and more on china, but last year alone the volume of trade between the countries amounted to 240 billion dollars, which is 64% more than in the pre-war period. and according to the data of the american government, beijing supplies moscow with machines and microchips on hundreds of millions of dollars and imports oil. last year alone, 107 million tons of crude oil and 8 million tons of liquefied petroleum gas. well , we are talking about the meeting between putin and sidzheng ping with the chief consultant of the national institute of strategic studies, alina hrytsenko, mrs. alina, i congratulate you, thank you for joining, dear friend, this is how sidzheng ping addresses putin, it is interesting what china receives from russia economically, how much does russia depend on it right now? well, russia depends on china quite significantly, this can be seen from the dynamics of foreign affairs trade and... in fact, we now china

is actually replacing and replacing is an alternative to the countries of the west, which after the beginning of the full-scale invasion of russia into ukraine, partially severed economic relations with the russian federation, a certain vacuum was created, which china is now trying to fill, western companies left russia some, some goods could not be delivered to the country due to sanctions and for more than two years since the beginning of the war and the introduction of the first ones. russia was still able to deploy part of the trade routes to the east, as a matter of priority to china various goods began to be supplied to the country from here, including cars, industrial machines, and so on. china also accounts for the most significant volumes of imports of high-tech goods such as computers, smartphones, household appliances, and so on. of course, not only the import of chinese goods is growing, but also the export of russian goods. goods to china, after

the introduction of western restrictions, an embargo on the supply of russian oil, including a price ceiling on gas. prohibitions on import of coal, russia redirected a significant part of flows to asia, and india and china are the most significant buyers on this market. yes, and now many experts are saying that with this particular trip, putin wants, you know, not just to confirm his friendship with sydzenpin, but even more to unite against the west, against the united states, how serious can be the consequences of such an even closer friendship well , about the consequences, the point here is that russia is a very important geopolitical asset for china, trade and economic, yes, an important asset in the context of security, after all, a long border, plus security issues, efforts to curb the spread of islamist

fundamentalism, efforts to work together in the field of anti-terrorist activities, control of drug trafficking, but on the other hand, for the economy... china is critical it is not so much cooperation with the russian federation as trade with the eu countries and the united states of america that is important, and we clearly saw this during sidzimpin's tour to europe, at a time when, at that very time, russia was certain shifts, diplomatic, ceremonial events such as the inauguration, the inauguration of vladimir putin, the victory day celebration, where so many gathered. discussed quite significant issues with emmanuel macron, the president of france, not only within the framework of bilateral relations, business, trade and so on, but also important geopolitical issues, including the conflict in the middle east and

the russian-ukrainian war, this indicates that , which is on the list of priorities, china today sees more benefits from cooperation with european states, including the russian federation is of course important, but here china tries to keep russia on a short leash to a greater extent, and in their tandem, russia is still a minor player today, china plays the role of the first violin, and we see that russia's economic dependence on china continues to grow, this is a trend that will intensify in the future, and in the future it can be converted by china into political influence, and judging by... the interview that vladimir putin gave to the chinese news agency xinhua before the meeting with sijimbin, there are already in principle such notes as vasal's notes can already be observed in his statements, in his theses, in the way he

tried to a certain extent how to curry favor with sijimbin, how he spoke about him, how he talked about chinese culture, while putin continues to emphasize that russian-chinese cooperation... is mutually beneficial and it is true, but putin emphasizes that this cooperation is equal, and here it is more desirable than real. ms. alina, be in touch with us today putin and xi jinping talked about the war in ukraine, although both call it the ukrainian crisis, and say that they are against prolonging hostilities, this is what their joint statement says, and that's what the current negotiations are about in general, says the chatham expert. this was putin's first visit since his inauguration, and he wanted to send a very clear signal to the west that this is a key relationship and china is firmly behind it. it is noteworthy that this happened after a reshuffle in the government, in which bilousov became

the minister of defense. in russia, there is a lot of talk about the coming to power of technocrats, and the message from russia is definitely that victory in the war in ukraine now depends on the economy. it is a question of who can last longer, who has stronger economic and financial muscles? putin is trying to show that china is behind him, and he thought he could overpower the west in ukraine. for sydzenpin, who looks back to the us, the war in ukraine is a certain complication, because apparently russia wants china to arm it. but for xi, the number one relationship is the relationship with the u.s. if he goes to ... arming the russians, he risks deepening trade war with the usa. biden has floated a series of additional tariffs this week. that is, in fact, the elephant in the room is the united states. there is some tension in relations between russia and china. putin hates the global

status quo. he wants to change that. china likes the global status quo because it believes that globalization will inevitably lead to its economic dominance along with the us. he does not want to destroy global markets, instead, putin is a destroyer. remember, a year ago, everyone was worried that russia could potentially use nuclear weapons in ukraine. china. i believe that russia was restrained, therefore there is tension in relations between them, the west will try to take advantage of this. so, there was talk of a peace plan again in beijing, and on the eve of the visit, putin gave an interview, as you already said, in which he allegedly declared russia's readiness to conduct peace talks with ukraine, will today's meeting change anything? in fact, several statements have already been made, and both xi jinping and putin have spoken. in favor of a political settlement of the russian-ukrainian war. in china, the fact is that they do not believe in victory

none of the parties in this war by military means, that is why they insist on peace negotiations as the only possible way out of this situation. at the same time, it is true that putin in his interview declared his readiness for negotiations, and we can interpret this as russia's recognition of its own inability to continue this war militarily, recognition that in fact russia will lose in this war. and russia's readiness for negotiations, but at the same time putin sent a clear signal to russia that china is not a more acceptable candidate for russia mediator and negotiator, while from the point of view of ukrainian interests, china is unlikely to be such a really effective mediator, and the point is not that china will allegedly promote russian narratives, russian interests, but the point is that china will promote chinese interests, it means that china is not impartial. side and it would really be better to find a country that could look at the process of peaceful settlement

through the prism of ukrainian interests , including, on the other hand, we can expect that after all , there will be chinese representatives at the peace summit in switzerland, most likely it will be a low level of representation, it is quite possible that it will be lihui, the special representative of the chinese government for eurasian affairs, but for china this is a matter of image and reputation, it is really important for them to be involved the process of peaceful settlement in order to maintain its own image as a responsible world player. ms. alina, thank you, alina hrytsenko, chief consultant of the national institute of strategic studies, was with us. thank you. so, whether will official beijing be able to influence the course of the war in ukraine? here's kerry brown's take. he is a professor at king's college london. xijin ping is a politician who adapts and adapts to those with whom he speaks. he gets along with the prime minister of india modi, with the prime minister of hungary. orban, with trump, it seems, and with putin. these two countries, russia and china,

share a large common border. historically , they have had a huge influence on each other. therefore, they must have a relationship. currently china's economy is nine times, if not i'm wrong, more than russian, it's not an equal relationship. however, china should consider the bigger picture and maintain acceptable relations with russia. the best way to do this is through increased trade. there is for this. china does not need a major confrontation between russia and ukraine to continue, the political settlement they talked about today, whatever that ultimately means, is important to china because the pressure from the united states to support russia is significant. after all, relations with russia are not so important to china, as with the usa, and therefore they had to come up with something, but china does not want to openly put russia in a vulnerable position. it was about a kind of win-win situation where everyone says they've kind of won the conflict, or at least they're

doing well. i don't think that will happen, but it is likely that at some point china will want to have a solution to this problem, because it is very destabilizing in its key areas of interest. a political settlement is more than a peace agreement, it is something much more complicated. in my opinion, what china is trying to do. that's it to work out a solution where russia can get at least something in this conflict, but not come out the total winner, but in general, this is a symbolic visit. xi jinping received a large delegation of putin with businessmen, representatives of the new cabinet, so there is a lot to discuss in this visit. well, putin flew to china, putin's two-day visit to china is the first since his inauguration. well, that's all for today, more stories on our site, and we...

informational. the field is raging, the latest report by reuters, already in the coming weeks the russian federation can launch an offensive in one more direction, namely in the sumy region, there are two aspects: they saw the russians that they cannot achieve effective results in the kharkiv region, on the one hand, and on the other hand , they see how they stretch the ukrainian troops and how information affect

the situation inside our country, this is from the latest news, in general i congratulate all viewers of the tv channel, traditionally every thursday... the project says velikiy lviv, we congratulate everyone on vyshyvanka day, but today we will talk about not so festive things, we will analyze the situation on front, in the kharkiv region, what will happen after may 18, because we understand that on may 18 the new law on mobilization will come into force and the rules for men conscripts will change, as well as whether negotiations are possible , there is a lot of talk, including on the part of the aggressive russian federation a lot of talk this week about the situation in the kharkiv region, the armed forces of ukraine seem to say that everything has stabilized, there is a lot of criticism about the fact that it was not mined like that, not such fortifications, although again, it is so, it is reading on the internet and not

we want, i don't want to assert, i want you to... ask about the information situation, who is in this situation and what it looks like, because at first glance, now the russian federation is achieving all its results in terms of information, there is something to talk about, there is something to brag in front of their viewers about what propaganda they are listening to, to direct, at the same time, if the offensive chokes ukraine as well. the armed forces will reject those units that entered the territory of the kharkiv region from the side of the occupiers, then the situation may change dramatically. how do you rate it, from the point of view information war, what is happening now in kharkiv oblast and may begin in sumy oblast? you know, it seems to me that russian society is not as interested in concrete results as ukrainians.

the russians simply see that there is this so -called special operation going on in different areas, today in donetsk region, tomorrow in kharkiv region, tomorrow in sumy region, the command knows better where to do what, and we have a completely different situation, because we are talking about our survival and our victory, and we perfectly understand what the russians are doing in principle armed forces, they are trying to stretch the ukrainian front, as they did, and force the ukrainian command to shift reserves from one direction to another, hoping that they will be able to strike where there are fewer forces. and achieve some success, they did not break through in kharkiv oblast, but opportunities may have opened up in donetsk oblast results in specific places, we understand that it is very important for them

to occupy the donetsk region now, they do not have enough forces to do it there, so what is needed to have enough forces? it is necessary to divert the attention of the russian ukrainian army in other directions, because this is a very stretched front, what is our problem and why does the right-wing president, when he says that we need, say, patriots there in kharkov, if we have enough forces so that they cannot stretch the fronts so we can focus in a specific area, then the front stabilizes and they stop, if we are constantly forced to transfer troops from their point of view from... one link to another, then they have a chance to gain an advantage in one of the directions that they will storm, let's say we decided to leave some troops in donetsk region, well, they broke through where there are fewer troops, in sumy region or in kharkiv region, you see, it's like clothes that fall apart under our hands, and we are forced to constantly close

various holes there, which they create, and that's it we need a strong fabric that we can sew together. thank you to vitaly portnikov for the traditional thursday analysis for the viewers of the project velikiy lviv says, a cut with all the statements of vitaly portnikov will be on our youtube channel, so subscribe, and i will move to our big filming pavilion, the largest, the largest discussion platform of our state in order to congratulate to all our guests, good evening, gentlemen, glory to ukraine, and we will... be represented by andriy smolii, political expert, candidate of legal sciences, international lawyer, good evening, good evening, oleg synyutka, people's deputy of ukraine, european solidarity, good evening, greetings, yury kamelchuk, people's deputy. of ukraine, servant of the people. good evening. hanna gubko, head of the board of the network for the protection of national interests ans. people's deputy of ukraine of the eighth convocation, if i'm not mistaken. yaroslav yurchyshyn, people's deputy

of ukraine. voice. good evening. vitaly smilka. we welcome you to our studio, a serviceman of the armed forces, head of the ato union of horodochchyna. good evening. and we also congratulate maryana prysiazhniuk, glavkom's correspondent abroad and expert of the stop fake project. good evening. a lot. worthy of events is what is happening in china, and if you believe what we talked about with vitaly portnik, we can really care about the trends, let's say, in relation to the future negotiation processes, because one way or another any wars concluded with some kind of agreements, on the other hand, the situation in kharkiv oblast, and already according to our situation, i would not say that this is a good tradition, i would like... if not during the war, but nevertheless, we always give the first word to the military, vitaly smilka, i have a question for you about kharkiv oblast, if

you analyze the information this whole week, well, a little bit, you know, from panic, this degree has somewhat stabilized, yesterday, today we still hear from the military that little by little the situation is leveling off, certain clean-ups are already being carried out, but still, as far as is clear, there on the outskirts of vovchansk... the russian occupiers are further away, your analysis of the situation and how long it can continue there, and here is the latest news: on is sumshchyna preparing for the same breakthrough in the coming weeks? once again, good evening, you know, i always keep my finger on the pulse, as they say, i communicate with the guys who are on the front lines, with our organization, directly, from our brigades, guys, i constantly drove with you before the air, you know, analyzing the situation to the kharkiv region, received a very good one... although, as you can call good, in principle , news, the guys called from the avdiiv direction, he says that in the avdiiv direction they were stopped with titanic efforts, with

great battles, bloody battles, the front stopped at avdiivka, the front has stabilized, uh, well, the enemy will try to go further in the avdiivka direction, but they have no success at all, why did i start from avdiivka, because i also communicated with guys from... kharkiv oblast, it is very difficult to get in touch , the connection with them is bad, but directly with the guys who directly took combat actions in vovchansk, the combatants will reach the streets, street battles, the enemy is learning, the enemy is learning quickly, the enemy no longer marches in columns, as it used to be, the enemy marches in small groups in groups, the enemy learned, did conclusions and accepts those tactics that provide certain advantages, and since ukraine eventually used them, they simply take them. us these tactics, hard battles, but right away you understand, with avdiyika i talk to the guys and from kharkiv oblast, there are questions that i once

voiced here on your broadcast, when the guys held the avdiyika, left to save people's lives , they faced the fact that there were fortifications, you know, there was a kind of beam, an interval of those fortifications , you know, if for television, for a picture, this is how it should be, how it it looks like it was just... the guys in kharkiv oblast were faced with the same thing, so much to stand, hold, have time to prepare for the construction of fortifications, and after avdiivka not to draw conclusions, not to check other structures, well, the guys say, we don’t we know what they did then, we saw where they were digging, for example, we saw what they did, our commanders, simple company commanders with a driver came up, you don't dig there, you don't bathe there, they told us that, they told us that , well you... you see, it's wrong from a point of view a military officer, even a military officer says, it is not who gave you such an instruction, who said here, where you are so far away, you understand that they said even then that if there is a breakthrough, we

will have to retreat as deep as you dug into those positions, that is, there is a big miscalculation in the preparation of positions, but it was dug in zapovchansk, you understand correctly, that is, in essence, this is a city, you understand, that is , by and large, it was necessary to evacuate with any schedules, therefore... the most difficult thing is that our people remain in ovchansk, that's the most difficult thing, and here you are in time you have street fights, as the guy tells me, we have to take into account that there may still be people there, and when you leave, let's say, with the same tank, you can't shoot, knowing that there is some military equipment behind that house, you ca n't shoot in that direction, because there may still be people in the house, but here it was unprepared, and the guys were for that, and when you know that there are still civilians in the basement somewhere. it limits you in the conduct of full actions, but the guys said so, already in principle that assault group, well, it is already

in them somewhere... if you did not exhale, it is already in they have actually ended, now they are still sending groups, but it is already a little easier in some ways, easier in that way, we have already taken positions and are now holding these positions, that is, the enemy cannot go any further, but the key question about vovchansk is still open. our directors, when you answered, literally showed yuri kamelchuk a frame before that, mr. yuri, i understand that it's definitely not you... you know, and people's deputies are not supposed to build defense structures, but in general there is a certain one, if you analyze the information information the situation in our country is such a certain claim to the authorities, i am diplomatically trying to express myself that they should have prepared the defense so that even for these five or eight, how many eight there are, it seems, the depth of the russian assault brigades went, but it was not prepared. the first

part of the question is whether you really agree with the fact that everything was not prepared there, and the second, we still have to draw conclusions for the future, how to prevent the same thing from happening in sumy oblast, we will even include representatives of volyn today, because belarus - it anyway plus or minus an enemy state for us. thank you for the opportunity to respond, to react , right now, by the way, there are many of my relatives in volyn, so in fact , fortifications can be seen from the windows of many. therefore, i will not say how there is, but we were preparing there a long time ago, much earlier than now , these positions that we are actually discussing, that is, i do not know why, to be honest, the more threatening part of us joined us, we we have been discussing this issue with colleagues both from the faction and not from the faction for a long time, and after those trips, even those that took place earlier so famous with photos of different factions, we still had conversations, and... from

the military and from the people who live there, which is not ready, we passed this information, i really don't want to criticize whoever made this decision somewhere in general staff or somewhere there, if they gave recommendations where it should be carried out, i don't really want to, but i have to admit the fact that there was no good preparation, and this is evidenced now by our honorable military guest here, that this is a confirmation from those guys who are there literally were and saw with their own eyes some these inverted cupped teeth are folded and so on, that is, this is a proven fact, there is no need to make a commission for that, it was seen with our own eyes, how to fix it now, let's enter here, i believe that in any task there is always last name, i don't want to say such a well-known wording that was said by a very unpleasant man, a name that i don't want to mention at all, yes, but that's

right, there are responsible people and... this responsibility for them within the general staff, or if it's a structure of the ministry of defense or the cabinet of ministers or the relevant vertical heads of regional administrations, should report more often, should report not only on paper, but also with a visual part. let it be considered in some closed version, let it be considered, perhaps by a special commission that has access to classified information, but including in this , the deputies who are part of the national security committee can participate in this, because this there is also their responsibility in terms of control. look, for example, at the situations that we consider, sometimes in the press, see in zma, when american senators or those who go to their national security committee analyze the situation from ay, they report to them, they are not ignored, they come to all meetings, including the minister of defense, with all due respect to what is being done now, as

weapons are supplied. yes, it is necessary to appear at such situations more often, this is one side of the coin, and the other side of the coin, we do not know for sure, for sure, how many have been prepared by the russians, who are throwing them into this meat grinder, the last ones who come, i don't know, tasters of death, probably what you say who are still entering, still trying to break through something, they understand very well that they will not pass, but they still crawl, well , they probably have some order there, so one of the factors why it was us... also, i don't know, did you discuss earlier today, but this topic is on the lips, they are trying to distract us the number one factor from other areas where we also need to be, here are the problems, we have to cover our reserves with some additional rotations and new recruits, recruits who have to go through training , and the second factor, what are they...