It is true Russia is the aggressor nation, yet it seems that that western powers are not sincere in bringing about peace in the Baltic Sea region. Their move to impose sanction on Moscow and thus pressurise it proved counter-productive, gathers Soroor Ahmed
Today’s era is not of war. The G-20 Summit passed this joint communique before its conclusion in Bali, Indonesia, on November 16. Two months earlier Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi conveyed the same message to the Russian President Vladimir Putin when countries of the Shanghai Cooperation Organisation met in Samarkand, Uzbekistan.
Apparently, this statement sounds very pleasant to the ears, but it needs to be understood at the very outset that the G-20 or Group of 20 is an association of about 45 largest economies of the world which discuss issues related to trade and global business, and not an organisation to discuss the global security issue. The best platform for this objective is the United Nations Security Council, which appears to have totally failed, especially in stopping the nine-month long bloodbath between Russia and Ukraine which has taken almost two lakh lives and displaced millions.
G-20 is not a grouping of 20 nations but has about 45 countries. This is because besides 19 states, the 20th member is the 27-member European Union. Here it needs to be mentioned that Italy, France and the United Kingdom are included in these 19 countries and do not represent the European Union here. In fact, Britain has now left EU.
These 25 per cent countries of the world – there are 193 members of the United Nations – have 75 per cent of global population and represent 85 per cent of GDP of the world.
For argument’s sake, specific quotes and phrases are coined in the modern diplomatic world, yet the fact remains that it is in the third decade of the 21st century that thousands of people are perishing every day across the world in different war theatres.
No doubt, the Russian-Ukrainian war is taking a huge toll of lives and Moscow is largely responsible for it. Yet one should not forget that more lives are lost daily in Africa and elsewhere. And for this the United States, the United Kingdom, France, Belgium and to some extent Russia (earlier the Soviet Union) are directly or indirectly to be blamed.
Notwithstanding this fact, no western media, nor any global leaders make any mention of them. Instead of bringing about peace, they aggravate the situation by selling arms and ammunition to different war-torn countries. Hardly any mention is made about these strifes in the United Nations or any multilateral platform.
The rest 150 countries outside G-20 are more or less treated like outcastes. Not only war, even the news of natural calamities and epidemics get much less media attention. This is not only happening now, but even during the heydays of colonialism.
For instance, the entire world knows about Holocaust in which 60 lakh Jews were massacred by the Germans during the rule of Adolf Hitler (1933-1945).
What is not known to the world is that Belgian colonists massacred something between one and 1.5 crore people of Congo between 1885 and 1908. This is one of the worst case of atrocities at the hands of European colonial powers, yet hardly any mention is made about it anywhere in the media.
Unlike North African countries (which have overwhelming Muslim population), Congo is essentially a Christian dominated country. The only problem is the colour of the skin of its citizens. It is Black and not White.
The claim that G-20 is an exclusive club of top 20 economies of the world needs to be questioned. In the name of the European Union, several weak economies of East Europe, such as Poland, Hungary, Romania, Bulgaria, etc. get represented. In contrast, there is no place for Iran, Malaysia, and several oil-rich Middle Eastern countries.
Apparently, the leaders of the G-20 countries put their heads together to pull the world order from the grip of recession in the post-Corona era. But it is the Russian-Ukrainian War which hogged the limelight. Members like China and Russia tried to resist it.
President Volodymyr Zelenskyy of Ukraine, while virtually speaking on the occasion, addressed it as G-19, thus obviously excluding the name of Russia. It is widely believed that President Putin cancelled his trip to Bali at the last moment when he learnt that Ukrainian President has been invited. He sent his foreign minister Sergey Lavrov.
Then came the news that Lavrov fell ill and had to be hospitalized for heart check-up immediately after arriving in Bali on November 13, that is two days before the Summit was to start. But the Russian foreign ministry strongly denied the media report and accused the West of repeatedly propagating false and fake news about the health condition of Putin and Lavrov.
Lavrov, on his part, remained in his hotel room when Zelenskyy addressed the Summit.
It is true Russia is the aggressor nation, yet it seems that that western powers are not sincere in bringing about peace in the Baltic Sea region. Their move to impose sanction on Moscow and thus pressurise it proved counter-productive. The Rouble did not turn into rubble, instead the European economies are facing acute energy and economic crisis.
Any war can be brought to an end by the sincere efforts of the United Nations. But the UN Secretary General Antonio Guterres was seen delivering his speech at COP-27 on Climate Change in Sharm-al-Shaikh in Egypt.
He sees little role in bringing about peace not only in Ukraine but elsewhere in the world. After all, how can one deny the role of the US-led NATO in provoking Putin to invade Ukraine. Isn’t Washington doing the same in the Strait of Taiwan?