Ukraine says it cannot agree to any ceasefire as long as Russian forces occupy about a fifth of its territory and missiles and bombs fall on its cities every day. President Volodymyr Zelenskiy has called for a complete withdrawal of Russian troops, including at a “peace” summit in Switzerland last month, which China conspicuously did not attend and to which Russia was not invited.
Russian missiles struck Kiev, Dnipro and other Ukrainian cities on Monday as President Xi Jinping embraced Orban in the Chinese capital.
In Kiev, an attack on the Omadit Children’s Hospital killed two people, including a doctor, and Mayor Vitaly Klitschko said at least 16 people, including seven children, were injured, forcing patients into the streets. At least 10 people were killed in the city of Kryvyi Rih, authorities said.
Last week, days after Hungary assumed the presidency of the Council of the European Union, Mr Orban visited Kiev and Moscow, but officials in Brussels and other European capitals strongly denied that he had the mandate to conduct EU foreign policy.
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“It is irresponsible and disingenuous for Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orban to use Hungary’s EU presidency to visit Moscow and President Putin,” Swedish Prime Minister Ulf Kristerson wrote on X. “This sends the wrong message to the outside world and is an affront to the fight for freedom of the Ukrainian people.”
Upon arriving in China, Orban posted a picture of himself with the caption “PeaceMission 3.0 #Beijing.”
The attendance of Mr. Orban and Mr. Xi represents a diplomatic victory for Russian President Vladimir Putin, who has long advocated for a multipolar, non-Western world order. He has argued that Western countries, particularly the United States and Britain, are responsible for prolonging the Ukraine war by failing to pressure Kiev to make concessions on territorial disputes.
Orban’s surprise visit to China came just hours before Putin made an official visit to Moscow to host Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi.
Modi was due to leave New Delhi on Monday morning for dinner with Putin in what was his first visit to Moscow since 2015. In a statement, he hailed the “special and privileged strategic partnership between India and Russia” and said ties had progressed in areas including energy, security, trade and investment over the past decade.
India’s increased purchases of Russian goods, especially oil, are helping Moscow withstand tough Western economic sanctions imposed in response to the country’s invasion of Ukraine.
Modi, who was re-elected last month, broke with Indian tradition of a newly appointed prime minister visiting a neighbouring South Asian country as his first stop, by visiting Putin, and underscoring the importance of India-Russia ties and his determination to transform India from a regional power to a global player.
During his meeting with Orban in Beijing, Xi called the Ukraine war a “conflict” and said he appreciated the Hungarian leader’s efforts to bring about a political solution.
“China and Hungary share the same basic position and are working in the same direction,” he said.
“Only when all major powers exert positive, not negative, energy can the dawn of a ceasefire in this conflict come as soon as possible,” Xi said, according to China Central Television (CCTV). He added that China has “actively promoted peace and advocated dialogue in its own way.”
In an interview with German newspaper Bild, Orban insisted that Ukraine simply could not defeat Russia. “There is no solution to this conflict on the front lines,” he said, adding: “If you look at the soldiers, the equipment, the technology, Putin cannot lose. It is hard to imagine him winning against Russia. The chances of Russia actually losing are just incalculable.”
Orban’s comments to Bild may reflect a harsh reality that Ukraine and its Western backers are unwilling to acknowledge, but Monday’s missile attack quickly highlighted the dire cost of Putin’s war. Officials in Kiev insist that a cease-fire without a Russian troop withdrawal would simply allow Moscow to regroup and plan further attacks to fully realize its territorial expansion ambitions.
China has rejected criticism from Ukraine, Europe and the United States over its decision to skip a peace summit hosted by Switzerland last month, saying it could not take part in talks from which Russia was excluded.
China, along with Brazil, instead put forward its own six-point proposal, and Chinese officials claim to have secured support from dozens of developing countries.
Cui Hongjian, an international relations scholar at Beijing Foreign Studies University, said that from Beijing’s perspective, Western countries have been an obstacle to direct negotiations between Russia and Ukraine.
Cui said he believes “Beijing needs to speak up and take a stand.”
As the war enters its third year and trade between China and Russia soars, China’s claimed neutrality has come under increasing pressure as evidence mounts that Chinese companies are providing financial and indirect support to Russia’s defense industrial base.
In public and in public rhetoric, Putin and Xi have increasingly shown they are aligned in their shared ambitions to reshape the world order and weaken the influence of the United States and its allies.
Xi and Putin met in Kazakhstan last week, where Putin spoke of progress toward a “fair and multipolar world order” at the annual meeting of the Shanghai Cooperation Organization, one of many multilateral groupings the two countries have used to expand their influence.
During that meeting, Putin proposed resuming the talks, which had taken place in Istanbul in 2022, when Ukraine was in a weaker position following the Russian invasion. Since then, both sides have suffered tens of thousands of casualties, and Russia has made only modest progress toward its illegal annexation of four regions in southeastern Ukraine, in addition to Crimea, which it seized by force in 2014.
Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov said in Moscow on Monday that Moscow supports diplomatic efforts.
“President Vladimir Putin firmly supports the desirability of political and diplomatic efforts to resolve the conflict in Ukraine,” Peskov said.
Zelenskiy said in a Telegram post that Russia had fired more than 40 missiles at more than five Ukrainian cities, including hitting homes and a children’s hospital in Kiev, and that the world should unite to stop Russian aggression.
“All forces are working to save as many people as possible,” Zelensky wrote, “and the whole world must do everything in its power to finally put an end to Russian aggression. Murder comes from Putin. True peace and security can only be achieved if we work together.”
The Russian Defense Ministry confirmed in a Telegram post that it had carried out a major missile attack on Ukraine on Monday but claimed the targets were “Ukrainian military-industrial facilities” and an “airbase.”
Shepherd reported from Taipei, Taiwan, and Shi from New Delhi. Serhiy Korolchuk in Kyiv, Kate Brady in Berlin and Natalia Abakumova in Moscow contributed to this report.
