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Kremlin dismisses as ‘fiction’ an FT report on Xi warning Putin over nuclear weapons
The Kremlin on Wednesday dismissed as "fiction"a Financial Times report that Chinese President Xi Jinping had personally warned Russian President Vladimir Putin against using nuclear weapons in Ukraine.
The FT, citing unidentified Western and Chinese officials, reported that Xi warned Putin at a face-to-face meeting in March against using nuclear weapons in Ukraine.
Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov, when asked if he could confirm the FT report, said: “No, I can’t confirm it.”
Peskov said the two countries had issued considerable detail in statements at the time on the content of their talks.
“The essence of the negotiations was clearly stated in the documents adopted following the statement, so there is a lot of information. Everything else is fiction.”
The FT cited people close to the Kremlin as saying that Putin had independently decided using tactical nuclear weapons would not give Russia an advantage in Ukraine.
The FT cited the people close to the Kremlin as saying that a nuclear strike was likely to turn areas that Putin has claimed for Russia into an irradiated wasteland while doing little to help his forces advance.
(Writing by Guy Faulconbridge; Editing by Mark Trevelyan/Andrew Osborn)
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Masters of deception, lies, disinformation and propaganda! I have no doubt at all that Xi Jinping told him exactly that and in no uncertain terms. They must be very ill at ease with the way this whole unprovoked and illegal war has turned out and carrying on. A quick victory would have been ok as it would have presented the world with a fait accompli – much like the invasion of Crimea. I suspect that they could live with that. The romance between the two is starting to wear thin as the Chinese are realising that in the vile, evil and mass-murderer Putin, one is dealing with a pathetic, reckless, puerile, deranged and rank amateur who has miscalculated so very badly on every front. The Chinese are the very opposite to Putin – they play the long game – what they do is measured, calculated, well thought out, taking into account the risk factor/fall out and causing the least disruption. They will certainly not sacrifice their economic well-being with the West, risking severe sanctions, for Putin.
A no brainer. I have commented before that Russia is now a vassal state of China, and the last thing Xi wants is to have the main trading markets of his export-led Chinese economy caught up in a nuclear conflagration, tactical or not.