The chair of the African Union, Azali Assoumani, said on Friday that proposals by Russian President Vladimir Putin to provide grain to Africa were not sufficient, and that a ceasefire in Ukraine was needed.
In a closing address to a Russia-Africa summit in St Petersburg, he also said Putin had shown readiness to negotiate with Ukraine, and that “the other side” now needed to be persuaded.
“The President of Russia demonstrated that he is ready help us in the field of grain supply,” Assoumani said. “Yes, this is important, but it may not be quite enough. We need to achieve a ceasefire.”
He is acting like Putin’s patsy here. The President of Rusia has caused this problem with his illegal war on Ukraine. Why should Ukraine accept a frozen conflict with Russia or accept Russian occupation of even an inch of their land? Why is he not demanding Russia, the aggressor, stop its illegal war and withdraw from Ukraine? Or demand Russia stop bmbing Odessa’s ports and allow resumption of grain supply?
Why is he blaming the victimss of Putin’s imperialism?
African countries in general doesn’t seem to have a grip on this conflict. I don’t know if they just don’t really have the right information, or don’t have the necessary experience with Putin.
I’ll disagree here. IIRC, 3/4 African leaders refused to attend Putin’s Russia-Africa summit, so it looks like only Putin’s supporters travelled to St.Petersburg.
And those who had allied themselves closely with Russia still took the occasion to mark a disagreement with the war.
Sure, it could have been clearer in opposition to Russia’s warfare, but that would also be extremely politically costly for them. The fact that they bring up the issue at all is great, even if they do so while trying not to lose their most powerful ally.
In the end, Putin wanted something and didn’t get it because of the war.
They don’t care, they have no dog in this fight, both parties are too far away to be much of a threat, and many rely on Russian resources to help keep their populations in line, like wagner or russia arms.
The ideology looks much different from Africa, it’s just 2 groups of white people fighting over something irrelevant.
It’s just brinkmanship. They’re in a position to negotiate for more than they’re normally worth given the political climate/war. They’ll position towards that and then try to use it to negotiate a better deal with the west and take the best offer. Unfortunately best offer may be personally enriching not country enriching
Nah, it’s just that blaming Russia gets them zero dollars while blaming Ukraine potentially gets them not zero dollars. Post colonial Africa has been provided so much international kool aid that not getting any gives them withdrawals. There is so much research around how providing aid to African nations is detrimental to their economy but is that goes against the interest of local politicians who use procurement of foreign aid as a measure of their performance in office.
One would think they would be against any type of imperialism and the taking of countries, but apparently it doesn’t upset them to see happen to others.
One can have objections but the reality is these countries rely on Ukraine/Russia’s grain exports. So its a rock and a hard place. Realistically Ukraine ain’t going to cut them off for these comments since it would be seen as a big dick move. Russia on the other hand, that is a toss up.
He is acting like Putin’s patsy here. The President of Rusia has caused this problem with his illegal war on Ukraine. Why should Ukraine accept a frozen conflict with Russia or accept Russian occupation of even an inch of their land? Why is he not demanding Russia, the aggressor, stop its illegal war and withdraw from Ukraine? Or demand Russia stop bmbing Odessa’s ports and allow resumption of grain supply?
Why is he blaming the victimss of Putin’s imperialism?
African countries in general doesn’t seem to have a grip on this conflict. I don’t know if they just don’t really have the right information, or don’t have the necessary experience with Putin.
I’ll disagree here. IIRC, 3/4 African leaders refused to attend Putin’s Russia-Africa summit, so it looks like only Putin’s supporters travelled to St.Petersburg.
And those who had allied themselves closely with Russia still took the occasion to mark a disagreement with the war.
Sure, it could have been clearer in opposition to Russia’s warfare, but that would also be extremely politically costly for them. The fact that they bring up the issue at all is great, even if they do so while trying not to lose their most powerful ally.
In the end, Putin wanted something and didn’t get it because of the war.
They don’t care, they have no dog in this fight, both parties are too far away to be much of a threat, and many rely on Russian resources to help keep their populations in line, like wagner or russia arms.
The ideology looks much different from Africa, it’s just 2 groups of white people fighting over something irrelevant.
It’s just brinkmanship. They’re in a position to negotiate for more than they’re normally worth given the political climate/war. They’ll position towards that and then try to use it to negotiate a better deal with the west and take the best offer. Unfortunately best offer may be personally enriching not country enriching
Nah, it’s just that blaming Russia gets them zero dollars while blaming Ukraine potentially gets them not zero dollars. Post colonial Africa has been provided so much international kool aid that not getting any gives them withdrawals. There is so much research around how providing aid to African nations is detrimental to their economy but is that goes against the interest of local politicians who use procurement of foreign aid as a measure of their performance in office.
One would think they would be against any type of imperialism and the taking of countries, but apparently it doesn’t upset them to see happen to others.
One can have objections but the reality is these countries rely on Ukraine/Russia’s grain exports. So its a rock and a hard place. Realistically Ukraine ain’t going to cut them off for these comments since it would be seen as a big dick move. Russia on the other hand, that is a toss up.
Meanwhile Putin is trying very hard to cut them off from access to Ukrain’s grain.