From Nov. 1st to Nov. 5th, 2022, professor Vladimir Petrovsky, a senior researcher of the Russian-Chinese Center of the Institute of Far Eastern Studies of the Russian Academy of Sciences, was invited by the Russian Department in Jilin University to give a series of lectures on the topic of “Global Security Issues and Challenges” to graduate students. They were held online through ZOOM .

There are five lectures in all. The first one is about “global security issues and challenges”. In this lecture, professor Petrovsky first introduced the framework and foundations of the global security system. And then he presented the six main issues that threaten human security in the 21st century: environmental and social threats, interstate conflicts, intra-state conflicts, radiological and biochemical weapons, terrorism, and transnational organized crime. Finally, he gave a detailed introduction to the 17 UN Sustainable Development Goals. In the second lecture, “Relations between China, Russia and the West in the context of the Ukrainian crisis", professor Petrovsky started from the origin of the Russian-Ukrainian conflict to the present outbreak of the Russian-Ukrainian war. And he also explained several hot issues nowadays: NATO’s eastward expansion, the recent problems of Russia-Ukraine relations, and Sino-Russian relations under the Ukrainian crisis. The third lecture is about “current situation and prospects of Sino-Russian relations”. The professor focused on Sino-Russian relations from the perspective of the cooperation, such as their cooperation under BRICS or Shanghai Cooperation Organization, and the new opportunities and developments for Sino-Russian cooperation brought by China’s The Belt and Road Innitiative. The fourth is entitled “Problems and Prospects of Dialogue on the Korean Peninsula". The professor explained various aspects of dialogue on the Korean Peninsula, including political and security dialogue, the New Deal for Sunshine, economic cooperation, humanitarian dialogue, and people’s diplomacy. The last one is about “Sino-Russian cooperation in Arctic region”. In this lecture, he introduced the construction of China’s the Belt and Road Initiative and Russian-Chinese cooperation in it, such as the Moscow-Beijing high-speed railroad project. The lecture also covered Russian-Chinese cooperation in the Arctic region, with a focus on the Russian project “Northern Sea Route”.

It is essential for each foreign language learner to have a global perspective and think about international issues. Especially in a turbulent situation all over the world and an outbreak of the Russia-Ukraine war nowadays, it is particularly important to fully know the concerned country’s conditions and its relationship with China. In this series of lectures, students gained a lot- the professor always left some time for students after each lecture, and they timely posed their questions, which were answered in detail. Through these lectures, students not only gained related knowledge, but also learned how to understand and grasp the international situation and issues.