For the first time ever, Russia and China will participate in a joint military exercise:
The exercises, dubbed “Peace Mission 2005” and involving army, navy, air force, marine, airborne and logistics units, will be held in Vladivostok in Russia’s Far East, and in the coastal Chinese province of Shandong and nearby waters, it said.
“The exercises are not aimed at a third party or concerned with the interests of any third country,” the Chinese defense ministry said in a statement.
Relations between China and Russia, formerly the Soviet Union, were strained by decades of mistrust during the Cold War, but the two nuclear powers have found much common ground in recent years and the military relationship has been blossoming, Reuters points out.