Francis Dearnley, assistant commentator for The Telegraph, discusses today’s “progress” in US-China relations following a rare visit to Beijing by Secretary of State Anthony Blinken where he met with Chinese President Xi Jinping.
The recent rhetoric between the two powers has been heated, to say the least. The last visit was canceled when a Chinese spy balloon was shot down over the US, so why now? Well, the rationale from a Western point of view is obvious, at least with regard to Ukraine: to stop Xi from supporting Putin, in exchange, it is believed, for commitments not to cut China out of certain economic deals.
Francis continues his assessment of important foreign visits and returns to the visits of African leaders to both Ukraine and Russia. Today, South African President Cyril Ramaphosa hailed the visits as “historic” and put forward a 10-point proposal, including de-escalation, the recognition of countries’ sovereignty, unfettered grain exports through the Black Sea, and the return of prisoners of war and children. to their country of origin. Francis notes:
There are more veiled rebukes from the Russian position than from the Ukrainian, especially in the context of references to the charter and the children, and indeed the Kremlin deemed them “very difficult to implement”, almost as immediately as they were announced.
President Zelensky also reiterated this morning that peace cannot be achieved until Russia leaves their territory. But I feel a little more softness towards the African position than maybe coming from the Kremlin. Let’s face it though all these summits have negligible impact until something drastic changes militarily or politically but they do show that the world is concerned about the length of this war which could benefit both sides depending on which one countries, which countries join.
Listen to the episode to hear Francis’ in-depth analysis of the latest diplomatic developments in full. Also in this episode, Dominic Nicholls, Associate Editor for Defense, reflects on the key Russian munitions depots hit by Ukrainian forces this weekend.
Last summer we saw a number of similar places destroyed, and that was then attributed to Himars attacks, long-range precision artillery. That caused Russia to put these things out of reach of Himars, so we saw a lull in winter and spring when they weren’t in range and Ukraine couldn’t reach them. We think the ones being used right now to hit these depots are probably Storm Shadow missiles, cruise missiles, British supplied or other similar long range cruise missiles that we haven’t really heard of yet but will have an effect on the battlefield elsewhere now .
Listen to Ukraine: the latestThe daily podcast from The Telegraph, via the audio player at the top of this article or at Apple podcasts, Spotifyor your favorite podcast app.
The war in Ukraine is changing our world. Every weekday, the Telegraph’s top journalists analyze the invasion from all angles – military, humanitarian, political, economic, historical – and tell you what you need to know to stay informed.
With over 30 million downloads, our Ukraine: the latest podcast is your go-to source for the latest analytics, live reactions, and on-site reporting correspondents. We’ve been broadcasting since the full-scale invasion began.
Ukraine: the latestregular contributors are:
David Knowles
David is head of social media at the Telegraph where he worked for almost two years. He previously worked for the World Economic Forum in Geneva. He speaks French.
Dominic Nichols
Dom is Associate Editor (Defense) at the Telegraph he entered service in 2018. Previously, he served 23 years in the British Army, in tank and helicopter units. He had operational deployments to Iraq, Afghanistan and Northern Ireland.
Francis Dearley
Francis is assistant commentary editor at the Telegraph. Prior to working as a journalist, he was Chief of Staff to the Chairman of the Prime Minister’s Policy Council in the Houses of Parliament in London. He studied history at Cambridge University and in the podcast he examines how the past sheds light on the latest diplomatic, political and strategic developments.
They are also regularly joined by the Telegraph‘s foreign correspondents around the world, including Joe Barnes (Brussels), Sophia Jan (China), Natalia Vasiliev (Russia), Roland Elephant (Senior reporter) and Colin Freeman (News reporter). In London, Venice Rainey (weekend foreign editor), Katie O’Neill (Assistant foreign editor), and Really Bowman (News Reporter) also seem to offer regular updates.
(TagsToTranslate)Russian Army
