Putin invites Xi to Moscow as Russia pursues alliance with China

Vladimir Putin invited his Chinese counterpart, Xi Jinping, on Friday to make a state visit to Russia next spring, as Moscow seeks to deepen its ties with China amid growing international isolation over the war in Ukraine.

Since the start of the invasion, Beijing has sought to balance its support for Moscow with the wish to avoid the indirect impact on its economy of sanctions levelled at Russia by the west.

While China has blamed the west for inflaming tensions in Ukraine, it has stopped short of supplying weapons to Moscow, while its companies have largely complied with the unprecedented western sanctions imposed on Russian business.

Chinese firms have eagerly filled the vacuum created by the exodus of hundreds of western companies that left Moscow in the days following the start of the invasion.

Gabuev added that a state visit by Xi to Moscow next year would be seen as a major public show of solidarity from China.

Vitali Klitschko, the mayor of Kyiv, said that there were no casualties from the overnight strikes.

The latest drone attack comes at the end of a week in which Russian forces launched a series of deadly bombardments of the recently liberated city of Kherson.

Also on Friday, Belarus claimed Ukraine was trying to widen the conflict, after Minsk reported on Thursday that its air defence forces had shot down a Ukrainian S-300 surface-to-air missile near the village of Harbacha in the Brest region.