(Un)timely thoughts about Sino-Russian ‘friendship’

Dictators are never short of superlatives. “Limitless friendship”, “new world order”: Hardly any bilateral meeting in international politics in recent times had been preceded by bigger expectations and fears than the recently concluded meeting between China’s President Xi Jinping and his Russian counterpart, Vladimir Putin.

The summit’s outcomes were rather unspectacular and very much in line with previous meetings.

However, the much ado around the event, including in the West, deserves some necessary comments – and perhaps a touch of sarcasm: on political semantics and Western perceptions and anxiety and a lack of psychological resilience.

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