Embarrassed Putin snubbed by African leaders at top St Petersburg summit

Vladimir Putin attends a cabinet meeting via videoconference, at the Kremlin (Image: AP ) Vladimir Putin has been snubbed by dozens of African leaders as the Russian autocrat deals with the reality of his nation’s dwindling global influence. Just 17 African leaders will attend a summit that begins in St Petersburg on Thursday. Four years ago, when the conference was first held, 43 leaders travelled to the event. There are myriad reasons for the snubs – Russia ‘s recent withdrawal from the Black Sea grain deal, to which multiple African countries were the main recipients, hardly encouraged participation in the summit – but the Kremlin remains optimistic about the outcome of the summit. Putin’s spokesman Dmitry Peskov, accusing the US, France and other states of ‘putting pressure on the leadership’ of African countries ‘to prevent their active participation in the forum”, said the summit would nonetheless be a ‘success’. Other Russian influencers are less convinced; on Wednesday evening, as the first of few leaders pitched up in St Petersburg, the Wagner Group de facto head of operations in Africa, Alexander Ivanov, accused the Kremlin of ‘sabotaging promising’ projects and overhyping relations with the continent. Putin (R) and Egyptian President Abdel Fattah el-Sisi attend a meeting on Wednesday (Image: AP ) Speaking on the eve of the summit on Wednesday (July 26), Putin lauded the African continent as ‘asserting itself more and more confidently as one of the poles of the emerging multipolar world’. He said: ‘The [St Petersburg] forum will provide a further boost to our political and humanitarian partnership for many years to come.’ He also met with Ethiopia’s Prime Minister Abiy Ahmed and Egyptian President Abdel Fattah el-Sissi, the first two arrivals for the summit. But his business-as-usual approach masked frustration at having been snubbed by many leaders of a continent Russia has never fully respected, according to one former US ambassador to Zimbabwe; the idea that Putin could snub Africa, not the other way around, is being significantly tested. Putin, right, and Ethiopian Prime Minister Abiy Ahmed shake hands in the Kremlin (Image: AP ) It’s the second Russia -Africa summit since 2019. The number of heads of state attending has shrunk from 43 then to 17 now because of what the Kremlin described as crude Western pressure to discourage African nations from taking part. Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov deplored ‘unconcealed brazen interference by the US, France and other states through their diplomatic missions in African countries, and attempts to put pressure on the leadership of these countries in order to prevent their active participation in the forum’. ‘It’s absolutely outrageous, but it will in no way prevent the success of the summit,’ he said in a conference call with reporters. Putin’s foreign affairs adviser Yuri Ushakov, meanwhile, tried to protect the perception of Russian global influence by adding that while only 17 heads of state will attend the summit, 32 other African countries will be represented by senior government officials or ambassadors. Irrespective of how the Kremlin twists the truth, the showing underlines Africa’s overall ambivalence towards Russia ; African states have abstained or not shown up to vote on United Nations General Assembly discussions on Russia / Ukraine on 52 per cent of occasions, while 19 countries have consistently backed Ukraine . On Wednesday evening, Alexander Ivanov, Head of the Commonwealth of Officers for International Security (SOMB), the Wagner Group branch in Africa, decried the failed promises of four years ago during the first Russia /Africa summit and said the continent could not be regarded as an ‘ally’. ‘In public statements, Russian speakers say that Russia has already received an entire continent as an ally,’ he said, ‘but this is far from being the case’. Ironically, much of the African continent, barring the autocratic leaders and juntas making use of Russian mercenaries and cheap weapons, has now found a new partner: Putin’s recognised-superior, China.