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Putin’s chivalry at APEC upsets Chinese officials

November 11, 2014
In this Nov. 10, 2014 file photo, Russia's President Vladimir Putin, right, puts a shawl on Peng Liyuan, second right, wife of Chinese President Xi Jinping, seated second left talking to U.S. President Barack Obama, left, as they arrive to watch a fireworks show after a welcome banquet for the Asia Pacific Economic Cooperation (APEC) summit in Beijing. It was a warm gesture on a chilly night when Vladimir Putin wrapped a shawl around the wife of Xi Jinping while the Chinese president chatted with Barack Obama. The only problem: Putin came off looking gallant, the Chinese summit host gauche and inattentive. (AP Photo, File)

In this Nov. 10, 2014 file photo, Russia’s President Vladimir Putin, right, puts a shawl on Peng Liyuan, second right, wife of Chinese President Xi Jinping, seated second left talking to U.S. President Barack Obama, left, as they arrive to watch a fireworks show after a welcome banquet for the Asia Pacific Economic Cooperation (APEC) summit in Beijing. It was a warm gesture on a chilly night when Vladimir Putin wrapped a shawl around the wife of Xi Jinping while the Chinese president chatted with Barack Obama. The only problem: Putin came off looking gallant, the Chinese summit host gauche and inattentive. (AP Photo, File)

BEIJING (AP) — It was a warm gesture on a chilly night when Vladimir Putin wrapped a shawl around the wife of Xi Jinping while the Chinese president chatted with Barack Obama. The only problem: Putin came off looking gallant, the Chinese summit host gauche and inattentive.

Worse still were off-color jokes that began to circulate about the real intentions of the divorced Russian president — a heartthrob among many Chinese women for his macho, man-of-action image.

That was too much for the Chinese authorities.

The incident at a performance linked to this week’s Asia-Pacific summit originally was broadcast on state broadcaster CCTV and spread online as a forwarded video. But it was soon scrubbed clean from the Chinese Internet, reflecting the intense control authorities exert over any material about top leaders while also pointing to cultural differences over what’s considered acceptable behavior in public.

“China is traditionally conservative on public interaction between unrelated men and women, and the public show of consideration by Putin may provide fodder for jokes, which the big boss probably does not like,” said Beijing-based historian and independent commentator Zhang Lifan.

Xi’s wife, Peng Liyuan, was once a popular folk singer more famous than her husband, and in contrast to her predecessors she has taken on a much more public role, prominently joining her husband on trips abroad as part of China’s soft power push to seek global status commensurate with its economic might.

Propaganda officials have built the image of Xi and his wife as a loving couple. Photos of Xi shielding his wife from rain on a state visit, picking flowers for her, or simply holding her hand have circulated widely on China’s social media, prompting much oohing and aahing.

“When the president personally held up the umbrella for the madam, it complies with the international norm of respecting women,” blogger Luo Qingxue wrote on the news site for the party-run newspaper People’s Daily last year after Xi was seen holding an umbrella over himself and Peng on a state visit to Trinidad and Tobago.

But Putin messed up the script Monday night while Xi chatted with the American president.

In the video, Peng stood up, politely accepted the gray shawl or blanket offered by Putin, and thanked him with a slight bow. But she soon slipped it off and put on a black coat offered by her own attendant.

It spawned a flurry of commentary on China’s social media before censors began removing any mention of the incident.

Li Xin, director of Russian and central Asian studies at Shanghai Institute for International Studies, said Putin was just being a proper Russian and did nothing out-of-line diplomatically.

“It’s a tradition in Russia for a man of dignity to respect ladies on public occasions, and in a cold country like Russia, it is very normal that a gentleman should help ladies take on and off their coats,” Li said. “But the Chinese may not be accustomed to that.”

One Comment

  1. wavettore

    November 11, 2014 at 12:58 PM

    Obama, Putin or Lao Tzu. You figure it out because if not….
    It’s already a done deal. The next US president will complete the job that only Jeb Bush can do. No need for him to be in the spotlight or do much campaigning when he knows he can use the same Deception that worked so well for his father and for his brother. After 9/11 they know they can do anything and get away with it. From the JFK assassination until 9/11 one hidden hand from Texas is ruling not only in this Country and with the next US elections it will make it official all over the World.

    It would only take one more trick of the tail and the Beast will have Humankind on its knees. Raised at the school of the CIA now he is master of Deception.

    Perhaps a few will still remember when George W. Bush told the terrorized US citizens to seal their windows with duct tape to protect from an imminent chemical attack. An irony like this could tell the whole story. The next day on the shelves of the stores all over the US there was no more duct tape for sale.

    All that is happening in our days is the prelude to enormous changes but even before discussing in regard of the possible remedy one must be clear about how we came to this point recognizing both physiognomy and origin of the threat.

    Since George H. Bush was CIA director, the US secret State agencies had played a double role to finally get to where we are today when every person is constantly monitored by NSA and other agencies not to report the information to the US Government but to feed with all data the embryo of a new superpower still kept hidden.

    In brief, here is how it came to possess all means and to know everything of everyone.

    In 1988 the ex CIA director was elected president although this was a US president like no other. His attention quickly turned to Saudi Arabia and Kuwait from where he personally benefited immensely in exchange for the protection of those tyrants and their oil while in the United States instead the president observed his son, Neil, to be the author of the largest robbery of its time, the “Savings and Loans” scandal. After a few years, the next largest robbery in history was Enron that financed the electoral campaign for his other son, George. Once he also became president, the son plotted the most infamous attack on US soil, 9/11, to begin the widest monitoring program ever conceived and to consolidate for 8 years the interest of one family above all. The day before 9/11 the Bush administration announced 2.3 trillion dollars missing from the US State Department and we have not heard anything about it ever since. Today that is the latest largest robbery of all time.

    In our days, a group of Zionists, like a hidden parallel government, with George Bush still today at the head of secret services in the US, UK and Israel, is the destabilizing force behind most terror events and with classified information at disposal and a private army is plotting what now would seem unthinkable to many. The spokesman for this group in the US Congress is John Mc Cain who reports the given orders weighing on the US administration. Incredibly, his picture taken with the chief of ISIS was recently found and reported by Senator Rand Paul.

    A World War and chaos everywhere have already been planned so that desperate people will soon invoke a New World Order without even knowing what that is.

    When Jeb Bush will be the US president, the next World War will be inevitable and also come by surprise.

    There is one Solution.

    http://www.wavevolution.org

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