Russia and China show their strength with joint military exercises during the coverage of the Quad in Japan
If Donald Trump won a foreign policy trophy, it was the Abraham Accords. With them, the president’s son-in-law, Jared Kushner, ensured the normalization of relations between Bahrain, the United Arab Emirates and Morocco with Israel. If Trump had reached a second term, they said at the White House at the time, he would have signed on to include Saudi Arabia in those agreements, a legacy left by Joe Biden.
His government is secretly negotiating the deal that could give him some foreign policy, an aspect of his mandate that, despite all the experience he brought with him as chairman of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, was fatally damaged by the chaotic exit. from Afghanistan. Biden also spent months trying to prevent a Russian invasion of Ukraine and convince China to condemn Putin’s “special operation”, but to no avail. Everything indicates that the president, who had known Xi Jinping since he was General Secretary of the Chinese Communist Party, underestimated the friendship he forged with Putin. In any case, the war in Ukraine has brought them closer together.
In these three months, both countries accelerated the signing of agreements that would allow Moscow to sell its crude oil in Asia and even build a gas pipeline to replace the European market. As if that weren’t enough, along with Biden’s visit to Japan, Russia and China have launched joint military maneuvers in what appears to be a showdown for the first time since the invasion of Ukraine. The day before, Biden had also sent them his own message, affirming that the US is ready to defend Taiwan militarily in the event that China threatens its precarious sovereignty. However, it is unlikely that this was a reaction to his statements, as military exercises of this caliber require a lot of planning.
South Korea, seeing two Chinese and four Russian military planes dangerously close to its airspace, even sent fighters to respond and launched “emergency tactical measures”. Japan also sent its fighters to watch them, while the prime minister hosted heads of state from the US, India and Australia for the Quad summit. The episode appeared to be borrowed from the Russian handbook, which received in Kiev UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres with the impact of two missiles and invaded Ukraine during a Security Council meeting. “The fact that this activity took place in the middle of a Quad summit is considered much more provocative than previous maneuvers,” interpreted Japanese Defense Minister Nobuo Kishi. “If the international community reacts to the Russian invasion of Ukraine and China trades with the aggressor, we cannot help but be concerned and should not ignore it,” he added.
Washington had prepared to respond to a North Korean missile test that would force the country to put that country on the agenda, but it was China that chose to speak with a display of violence.
Biden wants to show that Ukraine has not made him lose focus on other international needs. The White House is preparing another trip to Saudi Arabia for the end of June, but is more likely to announce that relations between that country and Egypt with Israel have normalized, Axios published Tuesday. Currently, two uninhabited islands, Tiran and Sanafir, are blocking the agreement. Israel invaded them twice in 1956 and 1967 to protect the sea passage, but returned to Egypt both times after difficult negotiations, as Saudi Arabia did not have a naval fleet to protect them until 1960. Since 1988, Riyadh has been asking for their return. In 2016, he gained the support of Egyptian President Abdel Fattah al-Sissi, who was opposed by his country’s courts.
An intermediate option would be the deployment of a multinational force, which Israel opposes. The Hebrew government is also demanding the setting up of direct flights between Saudi Arabia and Israel as part of the deal, always according to Axios. Saudi Arabia, for its part, wants Washington to give free passage in Yemen and forget forever the murder of Washington journalist Jamal Khashoggi, before being offered such a political feat and hosting him as a guest. The US president hopes that Saudi Arabia will help him stabilize the oil market so that the confluence of interests is a complex diplomatic puzzle that has yet to be solved.
Source: La Verdad
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