G20 | First meeting since the war in Ukraine between Blinken and Lavrov

(New Delhi) US Secretary of State Antony Blinken met briefly on Thursday – on the sidelines of the G20 which ended without a joint statement – with his Russian counterpart Sergei Lavrov, the first face-to-face exchange since the start of the war in Ukraine.

Their previous one-on-one meeting dated back to January 2022, a few weeks before the Russian invasion of Ukraine on February 24. However, they had since discussed on the phone, but on subjects other than Ukraine.

Thursday’s meeting in India between Mr. Blinken and the Russian diplomat, on the sidelines of a meeting of G20 foreign ministers in New Delhi, lasted less than 10 minutes, according to a US official. speaking on condition of anonymity.

The head of American diplomacy informed his interlocutor of the commitment of the United States to continue to support Ukraine.

Mr Blinken wanted to “send this message directly” to his Russian counterpart, the official argued. The day before, Antony Blinken had however assured not to plan any such meeting.

India had wanted its G20 presidency this year to focus on issues such as poverty reduction and global warming. But the war in Ukraine eclipsed other items on the agenda. The US Secretary of State has also demanded that Russia renew the agreement on Ukrainian grain exports, which expires this month.

This agreement sealed in July 2022 between the UN, Ukraine, Russia and Turkey has made it possible to limit the serious global food crisis caused by Russia’s invasion of Ukraine. It was renewed in mid-November for the four winter months and expires on March 18.

“Obscene behavior”

On the sidelines of the G20, Sergei Lavrov also spoke with his Chinese counterpart Qin Gang, whose country has close ties with Moscow.

MM. Qin and Lavrov “unanimously rejected attempts to interfere in the internal affairs of other countries, to impose unilateral approaches through blackmail and threats”, according to a statement from Russian diplomacy.

In front of his G20 counterparts, the head of Russian diplomacy castigated the “lewd behavior of a series of Western delegations, which turned the work on the G20 agenda into a farce”, according to the Russian public agency CASS.

“We must all recognize that multilateralism is in crisis today,” Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi said earlier in a pre-recorded statement at the opening of the meeting.

“The experience of recent years – financial crisis, climate change, pandemic, terrorism and war – clearly shows that global governance has failed,” he said, calling on the G20 to come together to overcome their differences.

India, which this year chairs the Group of Twenty, has a long-standing friendship with Russia and has not condemned the invasion of Ukraine.

New Delhi is also a major customer of Moscow in the military field and has increased its imports of Russian oil over the past year, contrary to Western countries.

Withdrawal of Russian troops

The meeting of G20 foreign ministers came after last week’s meeting of finance ministers, who were unable to agree on a joint statement on Saturday due to their differences over the conflict in Ukraine.

On Thursday, China again joined Russia in refusing to sign the joint communiqué following the G20 foreign ministers’ meeting.

Both countries have signaled their opposition to a paragraph demanding “Russia’s complete and unconditional withdrawal from the territory of Ukraine”, according to a summary of the G20 discussions released by the Indian presidency.

Russia also wanted to include in the document the need for an “impartial” investigation, after the explosions which damaged the Russian gas pipelines Nord Stream 1 and 2 in the Baltic Sea in September, Mr. Lavrov told the press.

Western countries and Russia blame each other for these explosions. The investigations carried out so far by the Swedish, Danish and German authorities have not led to the attribution of responsibility to a particular country or actor.