Xi’s Russia visit to navigate bilateral ties, boost global stability

Chinese President Xi Jinping’s upcoming state visit to Russia, his first foreign trip since being re-elected as Chinese president, will be a trip of friendship, cooperation and peace.

The visit, scheduled for March 2022, is set to map out the blueprint for the development of the ChinaRussia comprehensive strategic partnership of coordination for a new era. It will also push ahead with the practical cooperation between the two countries, and inject strong impetus into the endeavor to maintain peace and prosperity so as to jointly build a community with a shared future for mankind.

MODEL FOR MAJOR-COUNTRY RELATIONSHIP

Earlier this month, footage of Chinese panda named Ruyi went viral online, which showed him playing and gorging himself on fresh bamboos in Moscow Zoo. Ruyi and his buddy Dingding officially moved to their new home in Moscow during a grand ceremony attended by Xi and his Russian counterpart, Vladimir Putin, in June 2019. During that visit, the two leaders signed and issued a joint statement raising bilateral ties to the comprehensive strategic partnership of coordination for a new era, opening up a new chapter in China-Russia relations featuring higher level and greater development.

Now Xi is about to set foot on Russian soil for the ninth time as Chinese president. Over the past decade, the two heads of state have met with each other on some 40 occasions. Their frequent and highquality exchanges have always been guiding the development of China-Russia relations.

The past years have witnessed the steady growth of China-Russia ties with the inking of a host of important documents such as a joint statement on win-win cooperation and deepening their comprehensive strategic partnership of coordination in 2013, the China-Russia Joint Statement on a New Stage of Comprehensive Strategic Partnership in 2014, a 2015 joint statement on deepening comprehensive strategic partnership of coordination and advocating win-win cooperation, and the China-Russia Joint Statement on Further Deepening the China-Russia Comprehensive Strategic Partnership in 2017. In 2021, the two presidents commemorated the 20th anniversary of the Treaty of Good-Neighborliness and Friendly Cooperation Between China and Russia and made the decision to extend the pact. As the world is facing profound changes unseen in a century and the unprecedented pandemic, Xi and Putin have maintained close contact through various means, including a meeting during the Beijing 2022 Winter Olympics, traditional yearend online talks, calls and messages, and participating via video link in the ground-breaking ceremony of a bilateral nuclear energy cooperation project and other major events held in their respective countries.

Under the joint leadership of the two heads of state, the bilateral partnership has grown more mature and resilient.

As an ancient Chinese saying goes, “True partnership defies geographical distance.” China and Russia have blazed a trail in the

-Xinhua Chinese President Xi Jinping. growth of major-country relations featuring strategic trust and good neighborliness, setting a good example for a new type of international relations.