Kremlin, NATO and USA welcome Xi-Zelenskiy call on Ukraine
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MOSCOW, April 27 (Reuters) – The Kremlin said on Thursday it welcomed anything that could bring the end of the Ukraine conflict closer when asked what it thought of a phone call a day earlier between Chinese President Xi Jinping and Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskiy.
But the Kremlin said it still needed to achieve the aims of what it calls its “special military operation” in Ukraine.
The Chinese and Ukrainian leaders on Wednesday spoke for the first time since Russia sent its troops into Ukraine in February last year, fulfilling a longstanding goal of Kyiv which had publicly sought such talks for months.
The White House also welcomed a phone call between Chinese President Xi Jinping and Ukraine President Volodomyr Zelenskiy but said it was too soon to tell whether it would lead to a peace deal between Russia and Ukraine.
“That’s a good thing,” White House national security spokesperson John Kirby said about the call. “Now, whether that’s going to lead to some sort of meaningful peace movement, or plan, or proposal, I just don’t think we know that right now.”
Xi told Zelenskiy that China would send special representatives to Ukraine and hold talks with all parties seeking peace, Chinese state media reported.
“We have long said we want this war to end,” Kirby said. “It could end immediately if Putin would leave. That doesn’t appear to be in the offing.
“If there’s going to be a negotiated peace, it’s got to be when President Zelenskiy is ready for it,” Kirby said, adding that the United States would welcome “any effort to arrive at a just peace as long as that peace could be … sustainable, and could be credible.”
Kirby said the United States did not have advanced knowledge of the call, and would not necessarily expect to.
“These are two sovereign leaders and we’re glad to see that they did talk,” Kirby said
NATO Secretary General Jens Stoltenberg said on Thursday that he “welcomed” a call between China’s President Xi Jinping and Ukraine’s leader Volodymyr Zelenskiy, although he added this did not change the fact that China had still not condemned Russia’s invasion of Ukraine.
