Blinken in Kyiv, melodramatic G-20 summit and Karpacz without Ukraine
The G-20 summit in New Delhi, India, was held in the format of a Bollywood melodrama. No official representatives of the Ukrainian government attended the Economic Forum in Karpacz.
The visit of the head of American diplomacy to Ukraine is traditionally accompanied by a conspiracy theorist. This time, there was speculation that Anthony Blinken visited Ukraine to discuss behind closed doors the prospects of extraditing Ihor Kolomoisky to the United States and holding national elections in Ukraine next year. So far, Blinken has held talks with high-ranking officials and petted Patron the dog, while the United States has allocated another tranche of military and technical assistance to Ukraine, which includes depleted uranium shells, a traditional irritant for Russian propaganda. However, Blinken's visit was already preceded by Putin's caveman anti-Semitic attack on Volodymyr Zelensky, which the civilized world should hardly ignore.
As you know, Ukraine was not invited to participate in the G-20 summit, and the course of the summit in New Delhi provided a fairly clear explanation for this situation. India, as the host of the summit, tried to do everything possible to adopt the final declaration, so the topic of the war in Ukraine was made as toothless as possible in the document. Narendra Modi's triumph was facilitated by the predictable absence of Vladimir Putin and Xi Jinping's unexpected refusal. It seems that both leaders of authoritarian countries decided to demonstrate that they have nothing to do in the company of people who are developing civilized rules of the game. Nevertheless, the informational postscripts by Emmanuel Macron and Olaf Scholz are worth noting, as is the agreement to create a logistics corridor between Europe, the Middle East, and India. Its achievement is largely due to the hospitality of the Indian prime minister.
It is also worth noting the inconclusive meeting in Sochi between the presidents of Russia and Turkey, during which Recep Erdogan tried to convince Vladimir Putin to return Russia to the grain deal. This step is necessary for the Turkish leader not only to raise his own prestige, but also to plan the implementation of a grain conspiracy involving Russia and Qatar, which involves the sale of Russian grain in the Middle East, a significant amount of which may include grain stolen in southern Ukraine. The German newspaper Bild reported that UN representatives also tried to persuade Russia, promising to ease sanctions, but to no avail.
The 32nd Economic Forum in the Polish city of Karpacz was not attended by Ukrainian officials and parliamentarians, with the exception of the representative of the Servant of the People party, Oleh Dunda. The unofficial, but intensely rumored, explanation is the position of official Warsaw on the import of Ukrainian grain, which Kyiv does not like very much. Unfortunately, official Ukrainian representatives actually refused the opportunity to reasonably convey their position to more than 5,000 participants in the "Central European Davos." As a result, a number of discussion panels on the prospects for Ukraine's recovery were held without the participation of representatives of the Ukrainian authorities. It is difficult to disagree with Bartosz Cichocki, the Polish ambassador to Ukraine, who is completing his stay in Kyiv, that we lack understanding with each other. To miss opportunities for dialogue in this situation is short-sighted, to put it mildly.
Yevhen MAGDA, Institute of World Policy
