Xi and Trump hold summit in Beijing as Russia launches attack on Kyiv

GUANGZHOU, China – Ukrainian foreign minister, Andrii Sybiha, has condemned an attack on Kyiv just as Xi and Trump meet in China for high-stakes talks including the war in Ukraine. 

 Sybiha took to X to condemn Russia’s latest attack on the capital whilst addressing both the U.S. and Chinese presidents to leverage their power to “tell Putin to finally end the war”.

“This barbaric attack during such an important summit shows that the Russian regime poses a global threat to international security. Instead of peace and development, Moscow pursues aggression and terror.” Ukrainian foreign minister, Sybiha, wrote on X. 

 The ballistic missile attack which bombarded Kyiv killed four people and wounded thirty-three, Ukrainian authorities have said. 

 The Russian attack on the Ukrainian capital coincided with the highly anticipated Xi-Trump summit which took place in Beijing on Thursday. The Ukraine-Russia conflict was said to have been high on the agenda of talks between the two superpowers, though both sides are yet to disclose further details on the discussion of the crisis in Ukraine. 

  Kyiv has increasingly called on Beijing to use its close ties with Russia to push the Kremlin towards negotiations, with China refraining from directly criticising Russia’s invasion of Ukraine.  

  Instead, the focus of the talks between the U.S and China has largely landed on the relationship between the two countries and the Beijing-claimed island of Taiwan. The public messaging on Taiwan highlights Beijing’s broader priorities during the summit. 

 U.S. secretary of state, Marco Rubio, stated that the U.S. policy on Taiwan is ‘unchanged’. This follows a tradition of strategic ambiguity in which the U.S. recognises ‘One China’, but continues to maintain relations with Taiwan on an unofficial basis. 

“Our policies on that have not changed,” Rubio said, “It’s been pretty consistent across multiple presidential administrations, and remains consistent now.”

  President Xi Jinping warned Trump that any mishandling of the issue of Taiwan would damage relations between Washington and Beijing. China has described the question of Taiwan as “the most important  issue in China-U.S. relations”. 

“[T]he two countries will have clashes and even conflicts, putting the entire relationship in great jeopardy,” Xi told Trump during discussions in Beijing on Thursday, according to China’s foreign ministry.

Agreement on the matter would result in “overall stability” in the “bilateral relationship” between China and the U.S. 

  Much like the United State’s carefully trodden line regarding the state of Taiwan, China presents a public neutrality regarding the war in Ukraine, despite continuing to maintain close ties with Moscow. 

lw