No one can doubt that Spain is inaugurating a significant new stage in its history, of which the meeting between Pedro Sanchez and the Chinese president Xi Jinpingrepresents the last manifestation of this meteoric change (understood in historical times).
Sánchez is the first Western leader to meet with the Chinese president after his meeting with Vladimir Putin last week, and before they do both the French president Emmanuel Macron as the president of the European Commission, Ursula von der Leyen.
Apparently, nothing important came of the meeting between Putin and Jinping in relation to the war in Ukraine, but it is clear that the diplomacy of the Asian power has not stopped. He has in his hands an incomplete peace plan, but more than enough to start talking.
Sánchez is the second stop for the Chinese president in his strategy to find a solution to the war in Ukraine, which, one year after the invasion of Russia, nobody wants to last, except for the strategic interests involved on both sides.
What seems to be holding back is the desire to rebuild the strategic scenario that emerged in Europe after the Second World War, both by Russia and China and by the United States. In this field, at least apparently, a truce has been established: the ukrainian war It will not settle anything at that level.
Since the so-called crisis of the euromisiles, which occurred in the 1970s, and which represented one of the most tense chapters of the Cold War, we had not seen an escalation in Europe comparable to that posed by the invasion of Ukraine. Particularly after the announced deployment of short-range nuclear missiles in Belarus, announced by Putin.
But it is clear that Russia has not achieved what it wanted, nor that the United States, which is no stranger to the tensions that unleashed this war, has not brought Russia to its knees either. The impasse has been imposed. It seems a derivative of the truce due to the change in the global scenario.
It is in this context that Sánchez’s visit takes on all its meaning: on the verge of assuming the European presidency, Spain becomes an important link to unblock international diplomacy and restore peace in Ukraine.
But Sánchez has a difficult time: he is pivoting not only around Russia and China, but also around the United States and its NATO allies, who are not very comfortable with the war in Ukraine. They flatly reject Putin’s maneuver, but have found themselves trapped in an Anglo-Saxon strategy that is proving quite dangerous for the stability of the continent.
A very difficult role in which Spain plays a lot: since he assumed the presidency of the Government in 2018, Sánchez has been determined that Spain plays a more prominent role in Europe.
Circumstances favor this strategy, especially after the Brexit will lock down the UK on its own borders and distanced it from European forums, and that Italy opted for an unpredictable right-wing government, which has also distanced the country from the continental political orchestra.
Five years after the beginning of the “Sánchez era”, the national balance of his administration is somewhat more complicated, with a politically immature government ally that has made him falter. He, too, has endured other no less dangerous storms and some woeful bouts of incompetence.
However, despite all his limitations, Pedro Sánchez has survived a devastating pandemic, a devastating volcano for La Palma and also a war to which he can now contribute to put the finishing touch. If that happened, everything that happens after is to be written. But the scope of this trip by a Spaniard to the court of King Jinping is not small.