Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskiy lands in Japan on Saturday afternoon with a key objective: To speak in person with leaders from countries like Brazil and India who have taken a more neutral stance over Russia’s invasion.
Zelenskiy is making the nearly 9,000 km (5,600 mile) journey to Hiroshima on a French military jet from Saudi Arabia, where he attended an Arab League meeting. While he’s joining a Group of Seven summit, he’s more eager to see other invited leaders who hail from what is often called the Global South.
Zelenskiy is particularly keen to sit down with Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi and President Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva of Brazil, according to G-7 and Ukrainian officials. The Ukrainian leader is set to meet on Saturday with Modi, whose country has stepped up purchases of Russian energy and continues to seek weapons from Moscow.
Zelenskiy has also formally requested a meeting with Lula, who has yet to respond, according to Brazilian officials familiar with the matter. Brazil has no problem sitting down with any leader but it shouldn’t be imposed, one official said, describing Zelenskiy’s impromptu attendance as a potential “trap” for non-G-7 attendees.
The war in Ukraine has accelerated the shift to a multipolar world in which China, Russia and the US are all fiercely competing for influence. And while the G-7 nations and European Union have slapped an array of sanctions on Vladimir Putin’s government and sent military aid to Ukraine, some nations in the Global South have continued to trade with Moscow and expressed support for a Chinese cease-fire proposal that would freeze Russian gains in place — something Zelenskiy rejects.
President Xi Jinping’s blueprint to stop the fighting effectively puts both aggressor and victim on the same level, suggesting Ukraine should cede territory in order to negotiate. Lula, who recently visited Beijing to express support for Xi’s efforts, has previously said that Ukraine and the US share part of the blame for the war — even though he more recently partly backtracked on those remarks.
Still, engaging the Global South is a central priority for both Zelenskiy and the G-7 advanced economies.
Besides Lula and Modi, Japanese Prime Minister Fumio Kishida has invited the leaders of South Korea, Australia, Vietnam and Indonesia, as well as Comoros, who chairs the African Union, and the Cook Islands as the current head of the Pacific Islands Forum.
Zelenskiy is expected to join two Sunday sessions at the G-7, and also meet with US President Joe Biden. The US has been a vocal supporter of Ukraine and a key supplier of military and financial support. Biden has now dropped his reluctance to Ukraine getting F-16s after months of pressure from Kyiv and allied governments, announcing Friday that the US would support efforts to train Ukrainian pilots to use the fighter jet.
The meeting comes at a delicate time for the conflict on the ground, as Ukraine gears up for a counteroffensive in a war that is entering its sixteenth month.
And the setting of Hiroshima — hit by a nuclear bomb by the US in 1945 — is symbolic as Moscow periodically threatens to use nuclear weapons against its neighbor and intense fighting continues in dangerous proximity to power plants occupied by Russian troops.
While G-7 countries are already staunch supporters of Ukraine, the country has no better spokesperson than Zelenskiy himself, according to a French diplomat. The Ukrainian president again traveled through Europe last week, and US and Ukrainian officials are in constant contact.
The countries of the Global South are a more recent focus. Ukraine’s government traditionally has engaged more with the West and former Soviet states. It still doesn’t have embassies in some countries in Africa, for example, although Zelenskiy has said previously that Ukraine will open 10 new embassies there.
Ukraine’s efforts should be aimed at “countries in which our influence is still less than we need from the point of view of the national security of Ukraine and the interests of our people,” Zelenskiy said in a December meeting of his diplomatic corps. “This is a huge economic potential, and it is also a significant diplomatic opportunity.”
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A German official said the Japan trip was a potential “double-win” for Zelenskiy to meet both G-7 and Global South leaders, though the official voiced skepticism that Brazil or India would fundamentally change their position on the war.
The two emerging economies are influential players in their respective regions and globally as members along with Russia of the BRICS grouping of nations and the Group of 20.
As Ukraine prepares to launch its counteroffensive, Zelenskiy is also looking to make progress on weapons requests to the G-7 and NATO states for more longer range capabilities and modern fighter jets.
The UK previously said it was working with other countries to train Ukrainians and provide them with F-16 jets. It has also donated an unspecified amount of long-range precision missiles.
The question of actually delivering jets is not imminent, another person said, as the training would take months.
--With assistance from Arne Delfs, Jenny Leonard and Alex Wickham.
Author: Alberto Nardelli, Daryna Krasnolutska and Samy Adghirni