Putin will likely attend G20 summit but Zelenskyy won’t, believes former Foreign Minister Klimkin
Russian dictator Vladimir Putin and Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy (Photo:Колаж НВ / Sputnik/Sergei Fadeichev/Ukrainian Presidential Press Service/Handout via REUTERS)
Russian dictator Vladimir Putin will likely attend the upcoming G20 summit, despite Russia’s strong anti-Western position, believes Pavlo Klimkin, a former Ukrainian Minister of Foreign Affairs speaking during an interview with Radio NV on Nov. 5.
"We don't know if he'll go,” Klimkin admitted.
“I'm inclined to believe he will, because otherwise his position becomes even weaker. His rates are going down in the West, of course, but in the non-Western world... Putin has to go or to acknowledge that his position is very weak. I think he'll opt to go.”
At the same time the President Volodymyr Zelenskyy stressed that Ukraine will not participate in the summit if Putin will be there.
"I think he's right,” commented Klimkin on the President’s choice.
“It's his position as a political leader. It's also his personal position. It's not about some kind of physical presence, but about possibilities of any negotiations with Ukraine. The world is on the verge of a global reset.”
Klimkin thinks the world cannot exist as it has before Feb. 24:
"Our war against Russia is symbolic,” the former Foreign Minister explained.
"This is the war for the predictable world, for the chance to live a normal life and listen to each other. The other opportunity is to live with such a severe revanchist regime as Russia. It's a fundamental challenge of the XXI century: to design a safety system that will function properly, not like the previous one did, as it turned out to be a complete disaster.”
The 17th G20 Heads of State and Government Summit will take place on Nov. 15-16 in Bali, Indonesia.
Early, it was reported that Indonesian President Joko Widodo said that he was planning to make a phone call to three leaders who have yet to confirm their attendance in the G20 summit.
Widodo has invited Zelenskyy to attend the summit, despite Zelenskyy’s public stance of non-attendance if the Russian dictator also makes an appearance. However, Putin has yet to announce a decision on his attendance at the G20 summit. If he does, then Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov believes that Putin may meet with the U.S. President Joe Biden.
Biden, who has confirmed that he will be attending the G20 summit, said he had no intention to meet with Putin during the summit.
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