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| Words in the News
Monday 02 December 2002
Vocabulary from the news. Listen to and read the report then find explanations of difficult words below.
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Russia and China joint declaration
Summary: Russia and China have signed a joint declaration covering a huge swathe of international affairs, from North Korea to Iraq to the war against terror. The declaration lays out their common position on how such contentious issues should be handled. But is the rest of the world, particularly America, going to take any notice? This report from Rupert Wingfield-Hayes:
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| | The News | |
| | | China and Russia are fond of their joint declarations. First there was President Yeltsin's strategic partnership. Then came President Putin's treaty of friendship and good neighbourliness. And now this joint Sino-Russian declaration on a host of international issues from North Korea to Iraq to the war on terror. By combining their weight, China and Russia are making it clear they mean to be taken seriously as a powerful alternative voice in the world - a voice of equal importance to the United States. Certainly on North Korea their joint call for the Stalinist state to give up its nuclear weapons programme will be welcomed. But how much real influence either Beijing or Moscow has in North Korea is hard to tell.
China is reported to have been completely in the dark about North Korea's resumption of its nuclear weapons programme. On Iraq, China and Russia are both strongly opposed to American military intervention there, but ultimately neither is in a position to stop it. The power of either Russia or China to act independently from the United States is constrained by their economic dependence on the world's remaining superpower. In contrast, economic relations between the two of them are tiny. Last year total Sino-Russian trade amounted to just ten-billion US dollars. That's a mere fraction of the one-hundred billion US dollars in trade China does each year with the United States.
Rupert Wingfield-Hayes, BBC, Beijing
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| | The Words
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| | | joint declarations
official statements made by two countries
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| | | a host of
here, a lot of
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| | | combining their weight
joining their power and influence together
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| | | making it clear
showing in a way that's easy to understand
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| | | taken seriously
if you take someone or something seriously, you believe they are important and worthy of attention
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| | | alternative voice
having a right to express different opinions
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| | | call
a demand or desire for something to be done
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| | | completely in the dark
if you are in the dark about something you do not know anything about it
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| | | constrained
forced to behave in a particular way
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| | | a mere fraction
a very small proportion
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