Mud slung at neighbors' ties won't stick

This is an editorial from China Daily.

The high attention the world paid to Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov's visit to Beijing on Monday and Tuesday reflects the important role Sino-Russian relations play in the world today.

The attention was also due to some United States and NATO officials' recent hyping up of the bilateral ties of the two neighbors against the backdrop of the Ukraine crisis, with the aim of tarring them with a malign agency brush.

Yet their ties are on the basis of non-alliance, nonconfrontation and nontargeting of any third party. While those who view them from a Cold War perspective are trying to douse their relations with dirty water, it is akin to water off a duck's back.

China and Russia have committed themselves to lasting good-neighborliness and friendship. The China-Russia comprehensive strategic partnership of coordination is a natural outcome of the mutual trust forged by the friendship between the peoples of the two countries and the broad prospects that exist for mutually beneficial cooperation, as well as their shared advocacy for true multilateralism and common aspiration for the establishment of a global governance system that is more equitable and reasonable.

This is in stark contrast to the attempts by the US and some of its key allies to divide countries into opposing camps based on arbitrary "values" chosen by themselves with the intention of creating bloc confrontation that enables them to maintain their dominant positions in global affairs.

A strategy that is conspicuously being applied in the Asia-Pacific region at present, both by the US and its transatlantic alliance tool, with the former pushing NATO to aggressively get its claws into the region, the same way it has in Europe.

With regard to the Ukraine crisis, China has always held a neutral and equitable stance, and it has been working with other countries to try and secure a cease-fire. China supports the holding of an international peace conference in due course that is recognized by both Russia and Ukraine and ensures the equal participation of all parties and fair discussions on all peace plans.

This year marks the 75th anniversary of the establishment of diplomatic ties between China and Russia, and the two countries have embarked on a new path of harmonious coexistence and win-win cooperation between major countries and neighbors. Russia's presidency of the BRICS group this year and China assuming the presidency of the Shanghai Cooperation Organization in the second half of the year provide platforms for the two countries to make further efforts to promote a multipolar world and work for greater democracy in international relations.

Both countries are permanent members of the United Nations Security Council, and they firmly uphold the UN-centered world order and the basic norms of international law, while opposing unilateralism and hegemonism.

The two countries are expected to further dovetail their development plans and advance their practical cooperation in various fields.

And, in the spirit of equality, openness, transparency and inclusiveness, they will continue to promote the reform of the global governance system, and vigorously lead the building of a community with a shared future for humanity by shouldering more responsibility to unite the countries of the Global South.