Russian President Vladimir Putin in an interview with CNBC called President of the People’s Republic of China (PRC) Xi Jinping his friend. His words are quoted on Thursday, October 14, press service The Kremlin.
“I consider President Xi Jinping my friend, we have been working together for many years and are achieving good results both in the field of political interaction and in the economic sphere. I believe that this benefits both the people of China and the people of Russia and balances, creates a certain stability in international affairs, ”said the head of state.
In addition, when answering a question about the influence of the alliance of Australia, the United States and Great Britain (AUKUS) on the geopolitical situation, Putin pointed to the undermining of regional stability due to the creation of such blocs.
“In my opinion, being friends with each other is good, but“ being friends against someone ”is bad. This undermines the stability that we all talk about and we all care about, ”the Russian president explained.
Putin also expressed the hope that the situation will not develop “according to some unpredictable scenario” and will not cause “any additional tensions” in the region.
On October 2, Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov said that the alliance of the United States, Great Britain and Australia is in line with the erosion of the format of the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN). He also noted that the Indo-Pacific concept invented by the United States is aimed at the collapse of a single security system in the Asia-Pacific region.
On September 26, Russian Foreign Ministry spokeswoman Maria Zakharova said that the AUKUS partnership showed the West what a world order looks like, based not on law, but on new invented rules. The representative of the department pointed out that the legal basis of the world order was previously the UN Charter, and now “the rules are changing chaotically.”
The day before, Lavrov noted that the AUKUS partnership was a reaction to the European Union’s (EU’s) aspirations for autonomy against the backdrop of a hasty withdrawal from Afghanistan. He noted that the events showed that “voluntarist rules can be applied within the Western camp, if someone shows their independence.”
On September 22, Australian Prime Minister Scott Morrison spoke about how beneficial the partnership is for European countries. He recalled the opportunities for the European Union in the Indo-Pacific region and listed how much cooperation with Europe brings for Australians.
On September 21, Secretary of the Security Council of the Russian Federation Nikolai Patrushev stressed that the AUKUS partnership is another military bloc directed against Russia and China.
The Trilateral Security Partnership – AUKUS – was established on September 15, 2021 through an agreement between representatives from Australia, the United Kingdom and the United States. For the sake of new opportunities, Canberra terminated the $ 66 billion contract with Paris for the supply of submarines and provoked a diplomatic scandal.