RUSSIA- Chinese President Xi Jinping told Russia’s Vladimir Putin that the international situation was gripped by chaos, but that Beijing’s strategic partnership with Moscow was a force for stability amid the most significant changes seen in a century. Xi and Putin in May pledged a “new era” of partnership between the two most powerful rivals of the United States, which they cast as an aggressive Cold War hegemon sowing chaos across the world.

“At present, the world is going through changes unseen in a hundred years, the international situation is intertwined with chaos,” Xi told Putin in the Russian city of Kazan at the opening of the BRICS summit.

“But I firmly believe that the friendship between China and Russia will continue for generations, and great countries’ responsibility to their people will not change.” Russia, waging war against NATO-supplied Ukrainian forces, and China, under pressure from a concerted U.S. effort to counter its growing military and economic strength, increasingly have found common geopolitical cause. Russia and China, pushing back against perceived humiliations of the 1991 Soviet collapse and centuries of European colonial dominance of China, have sought to portray the West as decadent and in decline.

The United States casts China as its biggest competitor and Russia as its biggest nation-state threat, and President Joe Biden has said the democracies face a challenge from autocracies such as China and Russia.  Biden has referred to Xi as a “dictator” and has said Putin is a “killer” and even a “crazy SOB”. Beijing and Moscow have scolded Biden for the comments. Putin called Xi “dear friend” and said the partnership with China was a force for stability in the world. “Russian-Chinese cooperation in world affairs is one of the main stabilising factors on the world stage,” Putin said. “We intend to further enhance coordination on all multilateral platforms in order to ensure global security and a just world order.” Xi said cooperation in the BRICS group was “the most important platform for solidarity and cooperation between emerging market countries and developing countries in the world today.” He said it was “a mainstay force in promoting the realization of equal and orderly global multipolarity, as well as inclusive and tolerant economic globalisation.” (Reuters)

Photo: Russian President Vladimir Putin and Chinese President Xi Jinping walk during a meeting on the sidelines of the BRICS Summit in Kazan, Russia…[+]

Australia – A woman who tried to retrieve her lost phone from between boulders in Australia’s Hunter Valley became stuck upside down for seven hours before she was rescued earlier this month. Just the bare soles of the woman’s feet can be seen in photos of the incident posted on social media Monday by the New South Wales (NSW) Ambulance service. The woman had been walking with friends on a private property in Laguna, a country town in the Hunter Valley about 120 kilometers (75 miles) from Sydney, when she dropped her phone. As she tried to retrieve it, she slipped face-first into a 3-meter (about 10 feet) crevice between two large boulders, so deep that her friends were unable to reach her. The woman’s name wasn’t formally released by rescue services but NSW Police said she was 23 years old. (CNN)…[+]