China’s Diplomacy with Ukraine Based on Belt and Road Economic Development

July 26—China’s Foreign Minister Wang Yi indicated this week that the basis for optimism in peace negotiations between Ukraine and Russia is not some magic formula, but the prospect of benefits coming from the design of great scientific and infrastructural projects in the Belt and Road Initiative (BRI). Overlooked and/or not properly appreciated is his recollection of the December 2013 (pre-Maidan) action by Ukraine’s government in signing to join with China’s Belt and Road.

As reported in CGTN coverage on July 24, Wang pointed out that “Ukraine was one of the first countries to support and participate in the Belt and Road Initiative” and that the “two sides should capitalize on the role of bilateral cooperation mechanisms and strengthen practical cooperation in various fields….”

We must proceed on the basis of mutual respect and advancing beneficial cooperation, Wang said. The two countries have to view the relationship from a long-term perspective and promote the healthy and stable development of China-Ukraine relations.

Of special note, Wang made no mention of the Western-driven and -financed coup in Kyiv that followed in the wake of President Viktor Yanukovych’s December 3-6, 2013 trip to Beijing, meeting with China’s President Xi Jinping on joining the BRI. The governments of Petro Poroshenko and Volodymyr Zelenskyy came into being in consequence of that coup and the disruption of Ukraine’s plans with the BRI. However, Wang Yi simply reminded Ukraine of the road not taken, as if it were all water under the bridge, with China ready to pick up where things had left off.

CGTN reported that Ukraine’s Foreign Minister Dmytro Kuleba responded favorably. In CGTN’s words: “Kuleba said China is a great country, and Ukraine and China are not only strategic partners but also important economic and trade partners. The Ukrainian side hopes to jointly implement the important common understandings reached between the two heads of state, consolidate political mutual trust, activate cooperation in various fields, including economy, trade and agriculture, and strengthen exchanges between the two countries’ sister cities.”

The meetings in China followed the whirlwind diplomacy by Hungary's Prime Minister Viktor Orban to try to put a charge into possible peace negotiations between Russia and Ukraine, that might follow the formula offered by Russian President Vladimir Putin in June.  Orban visited Kyiv, then flew to Moscow and Beijing, then on to Washington for the NATO summit, and finally to Florida to meet with GOP Presidential candidate, former President Donald Trump. Russian President Vladimir Putin had offered a land-for-peace deal, that would create a neutral Ukraine, with is borders adjusted to account the regions of eastern Ukraine and Crimea, which have already joined the Russian Federation; those border adjustments could be the subject of negotiation.  But the real key to the deal that would end the NATO-sponsored war against Russia that has cost more than 700.000 Ukrainian lives, and threatens to explode into a nuclear confrontation as NATO uses Ukrainian patsies and its supplied weaponry to attack targets deep in Russia is the prospect for the rebuilding of the the devastated Ukraine into a robust, prosperous sovereign nation through an internationally sponsored development program.  That was the real subject of Kubela's mission to China, which would be a key guarantor of Ukrainian sovereignty as well as an engine for its economic redevelopment.

Sources report that Kubela was not so much representing NATO's sock puppet dictator of the Ukraine, Volodymyr Zelenskyy, as what is becoming a dominant faction within the Ukrainian leadership that wants to end the war, with or without Zelenskyy.  For several months now leaders from the Ukrainian military have been meeting with their Russian counterparts to hammer out an outline for peace negotiations. The sources say that the Putin proposal closely resembles what has been under discussion and basically agreed to by the military negotiators.

These sources say that Zelenskyy himself may be hedging his bets with the political demise of his mentally deficient chief sponsor, President Sleepy Joe Biden. "He is fully aware that a President Trump intends, as he has stated several times, to end the war regardless of what Zelenskyy does or says," a source stated. "What is significant is that he did not have the power to stop Kubela's mission, and may have even approved it."

The discussions in China have shocked NATO and its assets, who have scrambled to make sure that their "the war must continue" line is maintained.

China’s Foreign Ministry yesterday described that “Ukraine … has looked closely at the six common understandings issued by China and Brazil on the political settlement of the Ukraine crisis.” Today, China’s UN Ambassador Fu Cong said: “We note that Foreign Minister Kuleba said that Ukraine values China’s views and has carefully studied the six-point understandings proposed by China and Brazil on the political settlement of the Ukraine crisis….”  That proposal calls for immediate direct negotiations between Russia and Ukraine, which Kubela's statements seemed to imply was possible, in contrast to the "we have nothing to talk to the Russian invaders about until they leave the Ukraine"  of Zelenskyy and other government officials.

What Kuleba himself posted yesterday was: “Today in China, I held detailed and thorough negotiations with my Chinese counterpart Wang Yi about the path to peace. I emphasized that Ukraine needs a just and lasting peace, not just an illusion of peace, and I appreciate that this position was reciprocated. We agreed that all forces must work together to find common ground on the path to restoring true peace in accordance with the principles of the UN Charter. We also discussed our bilateral agenda. I thanked Minister Wang Yi for his hospitality and extended an invitation to visit Ukraine.”

Then Ukraine’s Foreign Ministry and the U.S. State Department came out with similar statements yesterday, casting shade on what happened in Beijing. The Foreign Ministry implied that there has been no change in Kyiv’s position: “Dmytro Kuleba restated Ukraine’s established position that it is ready to engage the Russian side in the negotiation process at a certain stage, when Russia is ready to negotiate in good faith, but emphasized that no such readiness is currently observed on the Russian side.”

In response to a journalist asking State Department spokesman Matthew Miller at the July 24 briefing to comment on the Kuleba meeting with Wang Yi, Miller replied: “So I saw the statement that the Chinese foreign ministry put out about those talks with Foreign Minister Kuleba, and I also saw the statement that the Ukrainian foreign ministry put out about it, which said that nothing has changed in their position, that they have always been ready for negotiations. They have always been ready for negotiations to reach a just and lasting peace, but that Vladimir Putin to date has shown no change to his war aims and has shown no real willingness for negotiation. So our take on this continues to be what it has been for some time, which is that when it comes to diplomacy, nothing about Ukraine, without Ukraine,” Miller concluded, emitting his mantra from the past.

"This is all diplomatic double speak," said a source. The 'nothing has changed' line doesn't cohere with a reality in which everything is changing Ask Sleepy Joe, if you can catch him at a coherent moment. Some people will just never see things as they are. They can't accept the fact that the NATO game in Ukraine is lost. And if the American people are given voice to their true wishes, NATO may be lost as well. And that's a good thing."