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Opinion | G20: Did the US just drop Ukraine for India, to counter Brics threat?

  • Ukraine’s request to address the G20 was refused amid speculation the US had dropped the cause in favour of a ‘ferocious’ courtship of India
  • The US sees India as a trusted ally and may be counting on it to prevent a rising Brics bloc from challenging the West

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Illustration: Craig Stephens
In a rare demonstration of consensus, China, Russia and the US have praised the G20 Delhi declaration in similar tones. But the bigger question is whether the West has decided to throw their support for the Ukraine cause under the bus, alarmed at the rise of an alternative power bloc after the Brics summit in South Africa last month.
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A year ago, the Group of 20’s summit in Jakarta was hijacked by Western agenda when Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky addressed leaders by video. This year, India would have none of it – it refused a request for Zelensky to address the New Delhi gathering and Western leaders did not appear to have pushed very hard for it.

Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov, who led his country’s delegation, praised India for the summit’s success in “awakening” the countries of the Global South and their resistance against attempts to “Ukrainise” the G20 agenda.

But Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau expressed disappointment at the so-called consensus document. “If it was just up to me, the leaders’ declaration would have been much stronger, particularly on Ukraine,” he told a press briefing in New Delhi.

Yet US President Joe Biden seemed happy to take an uncharacteristic back seat to Modi at the gathering, and on the eve of the summit, both leaders held a late-night meeting that reaffirmed the “close and enduring partnership” between their countries. To the surprise of many, the G20 declaration was swiftly adopted the next day, with Modi saying it was a “consensus” document.
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Modi had been working the ground pre-summit. In an interview, he touted India’s “human-centric model of development” as a “road map for the future” and pushed for Africa to become a major G20 stakeholder. His first act as chair of the summit was to invite the head of the African Union to take his seat as a new member of the grouping – a decision Modi said had also been adopted by consensus.
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