The Xi Zinping and Volodymyr Zelensky chat show

A telephone call between the Chinese and Ukrainian leaders has been in the offing for some time but now it has actually happened. But did the one-hour conversation get anywhere? It sounds like Xi offered a bunch of platitudes such as: war is not the way to solve problems, talking and compromise is the only way forward, talking peace not fighting war is the only solution. All very fine and sensible but the platitudes leave out one thing. It was Xi's friend, Vladimir Putin, who launched the war, so the intervention by the for-ever China president should be directed at the Kremlin, not Kyiv. While it is better for China to get involved in the name of peace rather than backing Moscow all the way, there will be no hope for a settlement if Xi's idea of compromise and talk-talk is for Zelensky to give up the four regions supposedly captured by Putin's invasion troops, some of which have already been deoccupied. Zelensky has said a million times there can be no settlement that allows Putin to hold onto Ukrainian territory. I assume he told Xi that so he got it firmly in his head. Admittedly if there is to be a settlement Zelensky may have to consider giving up a bit of his country. But if he does then it means Putin wins and that can never happen. So Xi I suspect went away from his chat with Zelensky with the realisation that his 13-point plan to bring the war to an end is going nowhere!