By Liang Xiao
“We shall promote the spirit of the Olympic Movement and meet the common challenges facing the international community through solidarity,” Chinese President Xi Jinping said in his toast at the banquet welcoming distinguished international guests who had earlier attended the opening ceremony of the Olympic Winter Games Beijing 2022.
Despite the lingering COVID-19 pandemic, the Beijing 2022 Games are unfolding as scheduled. Roughly 170 official representatives from nearly 70 countries, regions and international organizations, including 31 heads of state and government, members of royal families and leaders of international organizations, attended the opening ceremony on February 4. Their presence supported the Olympic cause in the spirit of friendship, solidarity and fair play.
In the words of UN Secretary General António Guterres, “The world now needs a successful Winter Olympics to send a clear message that people of any country, ethnicity and religion can rise above differences to achieve solidarity and cooperation.” Beijing 2022 is poised to deliver on that vision.
Mutual respect
Among the international leaders who showed up at the opening ceremony, Russian President Vladimir Putin undoubtedly became the top focus of many a media outlet. Putin landed in Beijing at 2 p.m., held talks with President Xi and then attended the opening ceremony at 8 p.m., flying out only three hours later. His country currently faces a major geopolitical security challenge, yet even amid tensions running high, Putin visited China as scheduled, denoting the central position of Sino-Russian relations in Russia’s diplomatic strategy.
During the nine-hour visit, the two countries managed to achieve productive results, signing nearly 20 cooperation documents covering economics, trade, investment, energy, and sports. They also issued a joint statement entitled International Relations Entering a New Era and Global Sustainable Development. The latter emphasizes the common positions of China and Russia on the concepts of democracy, development and security, and calls on all relevant countries and organizations to abandon any ideologized Cold War approaches, respect the sovereignty, security and interests of all countries, acknowledge civilizational and cultural-historical diversity, and act toward the peaceful development of all states in objective and fair manner.
China and Russia both strongly oppose a return of international relations to the era of big power confrontation and hope to forge a new type of international relations that does not use ideology as a barrier or the size of a country as a standard.
Another diplomatic detail that made the rounds on Chinese social media involved the brief yet kindhearted encounter between President Xi and Prince Albert II of Monaco, who competed in bobsledding at the Winter Olympics five times between 1988 and 2002.
President Xi told the father of twins, “I hear you’re going to bring home a Bing Dwen Dwen (the wildly popular Olympic mascot). Given you have twins, you’ll need two. Please choose a pair. We hope that as they (the twins) grow up, they will become as talented and keen on winter sports as you are.”
As both leaders mentioned during their talks, China-Monaco relations have become a model for friendly exchanges and mutual benefits between countries of different sizes, histories and cultures. -The Daily Mail-Beijing Review News Exchange Item
