Xi and Zelensky speak in first call since start of Ukraine war

Beijing [China], April 27: Chinese state leader Xi Jinping and Ukrainian President VolodymyrZelensky have held a telephone conversation for the first time since the beginning of the Russian invasion of Ukraine last year, Zelensky and Chinese state media said on Wednesday.
Zelensky spoke of a "long and meaningful call." The president said he believed the conversation would give a "powerful impetus" to the countries' bilateral relations, in a post on Twitter. Xi announced his intention to send a special envoy to Kiev and other countries to exchange views with all parties on a political solution to the conflict. Chinese state media reported that the president also issued a strong warning against a nuclear escalation of the Ukraine war and urged all parties involved to remain calm.
"There are no winners in a nuclear war," Xi said. Xi also reiterated that respect for sovereignty and territorial integrity was the political foundation for China-Ukraine relations, according to state television. The "complicated development of the Ukraine crisis" has a strong influence on the international situation, he said.
It is the first one-to-one conversation Xi and Zelensky have had since Russia's full-scale invasion of Ukraine more than a year ago. China is backing Russian President Vladimir Putin in the conflict, a stance that has earned Beijing much international criticism.
On the ground in Ukraine, Kiev's forces defending the city of Bakhmut in eastern Ukraine are fiercely trying to maintain control of the supply line for troops resisting Russian encirclement, the British Ministry of Defence (MoD) in London said on Wednesday, citing intelligence. Fighting mainly concentrated on an area near the village of Khromove west of Bakhmut, it said. "Ukraine's other supply options into Bakhmut are likely complicated by muddy conditions on unsurfaced tracks," the MoD said.
Meanwhile, Ukraine and Russia have once again exchanged prisoners of war.
"We managed to bring 44 of our people home," the head of the presidential office in Kiev, AndriyYermak, wrote on Telegram on Wednesday. He said the group included 36 soldiers and six officers who had been defending the south-eastern Ukrainian port city of Mariupol, among other places. In addition, two civilians were released. The Russian Defence Ministry said as part of the swap, 40 of its own soldiers had been taken by plane to Moscow for the necessary treatment and rehabilitation.
During a conference on the reconstruction of Ukraine in Rome, Italian Prime Minister GiorgiaMeloni said she expects Ukraine to be closer to Europe in the future. "Talking about the reconstruction of Ukraine means betting on victory and the end of the conflict," she said on Wednesday during the meeting also attended by Ukraine's head of government Denys Shmyhal and Foreign Minister DmytroKuleba, among others.
Meloni expressed certainty that Ukraine's future would be in peace, prosperity and ever closer to Europe.
Source: Qatar Tribune