Good thing that Germany's partners in The West blew up that temptation... 
Of course, it will get awkward if the continent gets a couple of polar vortexes in the coming months...
Posted on 12/25/2022 4:36:03 AM PST by FarCenter
US Secretary of State Antony Blinken probably thought that in his self-appointed role as the world’s policeman, it was his prerogative to check out what is going on among Germany, China and Russia that he wasn’t privy to. However, Blinken’s call to Chinese Foreign Minister Wang Yi on Friday (December 23) turned out to be a fiasco.
Most certainly, his intention was to gather details on two high-level exchanges that Chinese President Xi Jinping had on successive days last week – with German President Frank-Walter Steinmeier and the chairman of the United Russia Party and former Russian president Dmitry Medvedev respectively.
Blinken likely made an intelligent guess that Steinmeier’s phone call to Xi on Tuesday and Medvedev’s surprise visit to Beijing and his meeting with Xi on Wednesday might not have been coincidental.
Medvedev’s mission would have been to transmit some highly sensitive message from Russian President Vladimir Putin to Xi. Recent reports had indicated that Moscow and Beijing were working on a meeting between Putin and Xi later this month.
Steinmeier is an experienced diplomat who held the post of foreign minister from 2005 to 2009 and again from 2013 to 2017, as well as of vice-chancellor of Germany from 2007 to 2009 – all during the period Angela Merkel was the chancellor (2005- 2021). Merkel left a legacy of a surge in Germany’s relations with both Russia and China.
Steinmeier is a senior politician belonging to the Social Democratic Party, same as the present chancellor Olaf Scholz. It is certain that Steinmeier’s call with Xi was in consultation with Scholz. This is one thing.
Most important, Steinmeier had played a seminal role in negotiating the two Minsk Agreements (2014 and 2015), which provided for a package of measures to stop the fighting in the Donbas in the downstream of the US-sponsored coup in Kiev.
German President Frank-Walter Steinmeier has addressed criticism of his ties with Moscow, admitting Germany should have heeded earlier warnings from eastern European countries on Russian aggression.
"We failed on many points," the president told German public broadcaster ZDF. "It is true that we should have taken the warnings of our eastern European partners more seriously, particularly regarding the time after 2014."
"My adherence to Nord Stream 2 was clearly a mistake," Steinmeier said on Tuesday.
"We continued to believe in bridges that Russia no longer believed in and against which our partners had been warning us."
This mistake cost Germany "a lot of credit and credibility" in eastern Europe he admitted.
https://www.dw.com/en/german-president-steinmeier-admits-mistakes-over-russia-policy/a-61362153
Wonder how long Wang Yi made him cool his heels on hold?
Good thing that Germany's partners in The West blew up that temptation...
Of course, it will get awkward if the continent gets a couple of polar vortexes in the coming months...
But it must be pointed out that the United States should not pursue dialogue and cooperation while containing and stabbing China in the back. This is not reasonable competition, but unreasonable suppression; it is not managing differences, but aggravating problems.
In effect, it is still the old trick of unilateral bullying. It has not worked with China in the past, nor will it work in the future.
China will continue to resolutely defend its sovereignty, security and development interests.
The US must take seriously China's legitimate concerns, stop containing and suppressing China's development, and particularly stop using salami tactics to constantly challenge China's red line.
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little Tony gets his peepee whacked by an actual diplomat.
“ Most important, Steinmeier had played a seminal role in negotiating the two Minsk Agreements (2014 and 2015), which provided for a package of measures to stop the fighting in the Donbas in the downstream of the US-sponsored coup in Kiev.”
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Thanks to Biden’s puppet masters and their neocon allies there, sadly, is probably little chance of ever successfully going back to actually implement these agreements.
Sadly, this war is allowing me to brush up on my Cyrillic.
BTW - I posted a snippet of the readout between "Short Pants" Blinken and Wang Yi above, with a link to the full readout.
What an embarrassment little Tony is!
Merry Christmas to you and yours!
Gives a new meaning to "Christmas ham"...
Kind of moronic, for Russia, a country where 25% of the population still does not have indoor toilets, to lecture Europe about quality of life.
Russia and Belarus also have electricity, natgas and oil - unlike the chump commoners in the EuroPeeing Onion...
Asia Times again? ugh
you’re starting early with your anti-American Commie propaganda today ... couldn’t even give it a rest on Christmas??
'I kind of want to focus on making it through Christmas.'
>> “Russia, a country where 25% of the population still does not have indoor toilets” <<
Yeah, and they are all drunk on cheap vodka all day, and their women are all 300 pounds and toothless, etc.
Keep telling yourself that.
Before WW2, our propaganda portrayed all Japanese as buck-toothed, extreme slant-eyed, and practically blind, wearing glasses.
You are a chip off the old propaganda-believing block.
At least he didn’t post some Canadian propaganda rag touting Mistress Chrystia’s party line...
Sure that's why migrants from all over the world, are trying to get into Russia and Belarus(LOL!), not the EU.
Our Women of Walmart have teeth. :)
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