‘Putin is crazy’: China ‘thinks Russia is going to fail in Ukraine and will emerge from the conflict a minor power’. By Rachael Bunyan.

Chinese officials have blasted Vladimir Putin as ‘crazy’ …

Several Chinese officials warned Beijing must not ‘simply follow Russia’ and blindly support the war in Ukraine, in a rare rebuke of Putin’s barbaric invasion.

The officials said they believe that Russia will fail to win the war in Ukraine — and the impact of such an expensive and deadly conflict will see Moscow emerge as a ‘minor power’ with a diminished economy and a poor standing on the world stage.

The scathing comments from the Chinese officials … mark a significant turning point in the supposedly amicable relations between Russia and China — just a month after the two countries vowed to deepen their bilateral ties.

It now appears that President Xi Jinping may be doing his best — through his officials — to distance himself from Putin and his war, as the Chinese leader now focuses on improving his diplomatic relations with the West. …

Since Russia invaded Ukraine almost 11 months ago, Xi has stopped short of publicly criticising Putin over the war — but in November he issued a direct warning to the Russian President not to use nuclear weapons in Ukraine in his biggest public rebuke yet delivered to the Kremlin.

And Chinese officials have now said that within the halls of power in Beijing, there is a distrust of Putin. They said that Moscow did not inform China that it would launch a full-scale invasion of Ukraine before Putin ordered the attack. An official told the newspaper that Putin only told Xi that Russia ‘would not rule out taking whatever measures possible if eastern Ukraine separatists attack Russian territory and cause humanitarian disasters’.

Shucks.