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Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy makes a speech at the Asia Security Summit, better known as the Shangri-La Dialogue, in Singapore on June 2, 2024.
Et tu, Beijing? Zelensky accuses China of sabotaging Ukraine peace summit
Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskycrashed China’s party during an unscripted appearance at this weekend’s Shangri-La Dialogue in Singapore, accusing Beijing of undermining an upcoming peace summit on the war in Ukraine. According to Zelensky, China is pressuring countries not to attend the event in Switzerland later this month.
Zelensky called on Singapore’s prime minister and other Asian leaders to support the summit, scheduled for June 15-16 in Lucerne. Currently, 106 nations are set to attend the event, which aims to develop a unified negotiating position to present to Russia. But if China succeeds in getting enough countries to sit out, the collective position could lose credibility.
“China, unfortunately ... is working for countries not to come to the peace summit,” Zelensky said, adding that Russia is using Chinese influence to disrupt the talks. He criticized China’s role, stating, “That is not only support to Russia, that is basically support of war.”
Zelensky’s comments came after China’s Defense Minister Dong Junstated that China had not provided weapons to either side in the Ukraine conflict and stands “firmly on the side of peace and dialogue.” Zelensky countered by citing China’s increased trade with Russia and allegations of Chinese dual-use parts ending up in Russian weaponry. After Zelensky’s remarks, US Defense Secretary Lloyd Austinpraised Ukraine’s resilience and reaffirmed Washington’s commitment to Kyiv.
We’re watching to see who turns up in Switzerland as well as how the US manages Chinese support for Russia amid its ongoing detente with Beijing.
Not losing is the new winning in Ukraine – and that’s OK
Almost exactly a year ago, as the first anniversary of Vladimir Putin’s revanchist rampage into Ukraine approached, US President Joe Biden solemnly pledged to back Kyiv “as long as it takes.” Zelensky thanked him, saying “our common goal is victory.”
But the hole at the center of the kalach here has always been this: What does victory mean? In February 2022, merely surviving an onslaught by the world’s fifth-largest army was a major triumph itself. Then, as Western support cautiously expanded and Ukraine began to liberate more of its brutalized territory, the definition of victory grew apace: All of the Donbas. Crimea. Maybe even – “for God’s sake” – knock Putin out of power.
But now, after nearly two years and more than $100 billion in Western backing, grand ambition has given way to grinding stalemate. In 2024, the hard truth for Ukraine is that not losing is the new winning.
Let’s take a look at how things have gone over the past year. Notwithstanding the grit and bravery of Ukraine’s army, Kyiv’s highly anticipated counteroffensive failed to impress. Dug into trenches across the Donbas, Russia still occupies a fifth of Ukraine’s territory. While both sides ramp up their air war against each other, the trench lines in the steppe aren’t moving.
Putin, meanwhile, has dragged Russia onto a clumsy but brutally effective war footing that taps into its natural advantages in arms production and cannon fodd– I mean, manpower. Ukraine, by contrast, is struggling to keep its own ranks fresh. Zelensky is even weighing the wisdom (and legality) of a general draft – but to what end? Kyiv’s top general has already warned that without a major upgrade in Western support, his men can’t make progress.
And that support itself is evaporating. The online harvest of sunflower emojis is wilting fast as Western public opinion shifts elsewhere – to Gaza, to inflation, to culture wars, to elections. The Great Hungarian Holdout is hamstringing further EU aid to Kyiv, and US Republicans are doing the same: They have shrewdly assessed that in 2024, securing America’s borders may be more important to US voters than restoring Ukraine’s.
Looming over all of this, of course, is what happens in the US election, where Joe Biden is so unpopular – with 39% approval, the lowest of any modern president at this point in a first term – that he’s neck and neck in the polls with a guy who has been indicted 91 times, impeached twice, and who told half of America to “rot in hell” for Christmas.
For the aging and unpopular Biden, nosing out a victory against Putinophile-in-Chief Trump would itself be a kind of winning that looks a lot more like merely not losing.
Against this backdrop, US and EU officials are already said to be signaling, sotto voce, that their new aim is merely to bolster Ukraine’s defenses to help its negotiating position, rather than “win” the war. Not losing is the new winning.
The reality, for Kyiv, is that things can probably only get worse from here, not better. Some kind of negotiated cease-fire along lines that look a lot like today’s front lines feels almost inevitable this year.
Some people will naturally see that as a victory for Putin. A reward for needlessly smashing a neighbor out of pure post-imperial spite. Perhaps, but if six-figure casualties, an economy dramatically more isolated from the West and indentured to the East, and a NATO larger and more united than ever before are what constitutes “winning,” then that’s a kind of victory that would make Pyrrhus himself cringe.
The trick for Zelensky – and the former actor’s hardest political role yet – will be to convince his own people, particularly the more nationalistic-minded among them, that not losing more than a fifth of the country is actually, in the grander scheme of things, winning.
The task for Zelensky’s Western friends, meanwhile, will be to make it clear that this grander scheme of things involves a way for the remaining 80% of Ukraine to join Western blocs that will keep its people, and its land, safer from future Russian revanchism.
In other words, after two years of war, the earlier and more extravagant visions of “victory” are almost surefire losers. What’s it going to take for Ukraine to win? Not losing is a good enough place to start.
Written by Alex Kliment, a regular writer and editor of the Daily, He also directs Puppet Regime, GZERO’s award-winning political satire puppet series, and is a contributing correspondent to our nationally syndicated TV program "GZERO World with Ian Bremmer."
The state of multilateralism: Shaky, fragile & stretched to capacity
Dr. Comfort Ero of the International Crisis Group has spent her career tackling the most difficult conflicts in the world, often exacerbated by severe environmental or social disasters. But as the climate crisis and war in Ukraine compound the forces pushing many fragile societies to the brink, she says multilateral institutions like the United Nations are not prepared to meet the challenge.
Faced with state collapse, food insecurity, and lack of governance, countries like Libya, Lebanon and Sri Lanka are not able to access the help they need to stabilize, build resilience and thrive.
“Countries are already facing difficult trend lines with a multilateral system that is shaky, that is fragile, that is already stretched to its capacity, not able to deal.” she said during a Global Stage livestream event at UN headquarters in New York on September 22, on the sidelines of the UN General Assembly.
The discussion was moderated by Nicholas Thompson of The Atlantic and was held by GZERO Media in collaboration with the United Nations, the Complex Risk Analytics Fund, and the Early Warnings for All initiative.
Watch the full Global Stage conversation: Can data and AI save lives and make the world safer?
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