The Wall Street Journal shared a rumor on Thursday, citing anonymous people “familiar,” that the Communist Party of China proposed to President Donald Trump that Beijing could host a summit between him and Russian strongman Vladimir Putin to discuss the war on Ukraine.
The reported summit would not include Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky, the newspaper claimed.
The White House has not commented at press time on the report, while the Chinese Foreign Ministry refused to answer a question on the matter on Thursday and the Kremlin stated that it did not yet have a full list of countries that would help mediate the situation. The report followed the first phone call between President Trump and Putin since Trump began his second term in office on Wednesday, which preceded a call immediately afterward between Trump and Zelensky.
Both Zelensky and Trump proclaimed themselves pleased with their conversations and ready to negotiate peace to end the Russian invasion of Ukraine that began in 2022.
According to the Wall Street Journal, China has sent lower-level officials to “float” using the country as an intermediary to host a Trump-Putin summit “to facilitate peacekeeping efforts.” The deal would also include a proposal for China to send its military to Europe for “peacekeeping” – an alarming, if true, proposal as the Ukraine war theater is already hosting Asian communist troops from North Korea.
“The Chinese proposal doesn’t include any commitment from Beijing to reduce its enormous economic support for Moscow,” the newspaper added.
The report did not indicate that any relevant party is taking the proposal seriously. An unnamed “White House official” dismissed the idea as “not viable at all.” Trump himself did not give any indication that China would be involved in such an effort, telling reporters on Wednesday instead that he is considering Saudi Arabia as a viable host country.
“We ultimately expect to meet,” Trump said of Putin. “In fact, we expect that he’ll come here, and I’ll go there, and we’re going to meet also, probably in Saudi Arabia. The first time we’ll meet in Saudi Arabia.”
Saudi Arabia maintains friendly relations with both Ukraine and Russia – a rarity in international relations – and has helped brokered prisoner swaps and bring Ukrainian grain to the world uninterrupted.
The Kremlin, following the conversation between Trump and Putin, confirmed that the two agreed to begin planning for an in-person summit as soon as possible, but declined to confirm that China had a role to play in the matter.
“At this point, it is impossible to provide any details about the parties involved in the talks. No substantive discussions have taken place at the working level yet,” top Putin spokesman Dmitry Peskov said on Thursday.
The Chinese Foreign Ministry also received a question during its regular briefing on Thursday regarding the Journal report, but refused to offer any viable answer.
“I have nothing to share on that,” spokesman Guo Jiakun told reporters.
Responding generally to the news that Putin and Trump had spoken to each other, Guo stated that China “believes that dialogue and negotiation is the only viable way out of the crisis and has been committed to promoting talks for peace.”
“China supports all effort conducive to the peaceful settlement of the crisis, and will maintain communication with relevant parties and play a constructive role in promoting the political settlement of the crisis,” he added.
Trump announced on Wednesday that he had enjoyed “a lengthy and highly productive phone call” with Putin, which he described as a first step to ending Putin’s invasion of Ukraine. In addition to Ukraine, Trump said the two leaders discussed “the Middle East, Energy, Artificial Intelligence, the power of the Dollar, and various other subjects.”
“As we both agreed, we want to stop the millions of deaths taking place in the War with Russia/Ukraine. President Putin even used my very strong Campaign motto of, ‘COMMON SENSE.’ We both believe very strongly in it,” Trump asserted, adding that he would speak with Zelensky later in the day.
Zelensky confirmed his conversation with Trump later on Wednesday.
“No one wants peace more than Ukraine. Together with the U.S., we are charting our next steps to stop Russian aggression and ensure a lasting, reliable peace. As President Trump said, let’s get it done,” Zelenky wrote in a social media message confirming the call.
The Chinese government under genocidal dictator Xi Jinping has made becoming a diplomatic powerhouse a policy priority, though it has had little success in establishing itself outside of Asia. The most significant foreign policy achievement for China in recent memory was the role it played in normalizing relations between Iran and Saudi Arabia, the result of talks hosted in Beijing in 2023. The move preceded the China-led BRICS coalition inviting both countries to join and, while Iran rapidly integrated itself to the group, Saudi Arabia has still not responded to the invitation that press time, according to reports.
The Chinese government first attempted to become a significant player in the Russian invasion of Ukraine by presenting a “peace plan” to both parties in 2023 that required Ukraine to cede major portions of its territory to Russia and did not offer any specifics on how to deconflict. The plan called for both Russia and Ukraine to “calm down as soon as possible” and simply stop fighting. Kyiv and Moscow both largely ignored the proposal, even as the Chinese government sent a special envoy to both capitals to discuss the plan.
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