DOMINANT ANGLE
Beijing views the invitation to Vladimir Putin for the G20 in Miami in light of an energy truce that is still uncertain and persistent diplomatic frictions between Moscow and Washington at the UN.
Dominant angle identified — does not reflect unanimity of this country’s media
KEY POINTS
- 01
The Kremlin described the US refusal to grant a visa to Russian Deputy Foreign Minister Alexander Alimov before the UN General Assembly as a "hostile" act (CGTN).
- 02
Volodymyr Zelensky warned at the UN that Kyiv would make the winter "painful" for Russia if talks on an energy ceasefire failed before the cold weather sets in (SCMP).
- 03
Kyiv and its allies are seeking to secure limited agreements on energy infrastructure and Black Sea transport before winter, fearing new Russian strikes (SCMP).
ANALYSIS
Beijing, September 24, 2026. The announcement made on Wednesday by US Secretary of State Marco Rubio to invite Vladimir Putin to the G20 summit in Miami in December reaches the Chinese press in a climate of unresolved tensions between Moscow and Washington at the United Nations. Kremlin spokesman Dmitri Peskov expressed his gratitude for the invitation, specifying that it would be handled through usual diplomatic channels. But the media followed in Beijing, CGTN and the South China Morning Post, mainly retain the signs of friction that preceded this gesture of openness.
CGTN reports that the Kremlin qualified the US refusal to grant a visa to Russian Deputy Foreign Minister Alexander Alimov as a "hostile act", preventing him from traveling to New York ahead of the General Assembly. According to Peskov, this decision violates US obligations as the host country of the UN headquarters; Moscow announced that it would raise the issue with Washington. The contrast is clear: on the one hand, a presidential invitation to the G20; on the other hand, a refusal of entry opposed to a high-ranking Russian diplomat the same week.
The South China Morning Post, for its part, retains the warning launched on Wednesday by Volodymyr Zelensky at the UN tribune. The Ukrainian president warned that if the talks on a limited ceasefire on energy infrastructure and transport in the Black Sea failed before winter, Kyiv would have "no other choice" but to make the cold season "painful" for Russia. Rubio nevertheless expressed confidence that Moscow and Kyiv had signaled a common interest in such a limited pause, distinct from a global ceasefire.
For the Chinese press, the invitation to the G20 is therefore part of a sequence where the diplomacy displayed by Washington coexists with acts of mutual distrust and a war that continues on the ground. None of the media in the corpus consulted directly mentions the modalities of the Miami summit or the issue of an International Criminal Court warrant targeting Putin; attention remains focused on the fragile balance between gestures of appeasement and power struggles that persist in New York as well as on the Ukrainian energy front.
