Reflecting on the mission by the African delegation pushing for an end to war between Ukraine and Russia, Cyril Ramaphosa called it impactful on Sunday.
The mission included the presidents of South Africa, Senegal, Comoros and Zambia, as well as top officials from Uganda, Egypt and Congo-Brazzaville.
“Our mission was impactful. Its real success obviously will be measured on the ultimate objective of stopping the war.”
The African delegation met with president Volodymir Zelinsky of Ukraine on June 16 then with Vladimir Poutin of the Russian Federation on June 17.
Ramaphosa listed 10 principles, which included de-escalation, the recognition of countries’ sovereignty, security guarantees for all countries, unimpeded grain exports through the Black Sea and sending prisoners of war and children back to their countries of origin.
“The agreement that they are willing to engage with African leaders on this is a huge achievement for us, because now Africa is in the frame, Africa will be participating, and we’re participating positively, without trying to diminish the other efforts that are underway,” the 70-year-old leader said.
The delegation brought the voice of a continent which has been repeatedly told to chose a side.
African countries have been divided over their response to the fighting, while some have voted a UN resolution condemning the ‘invasion of Ukraine”, others have remained neutral, or voted with Moscow against such a resolution.
President Putin on Saturday met with a group of leaders of African countries who traveled to Russia on a self-styled “peace mission” the day after they went to Ukraine, but the meeting ended with no visible progress. The seven African leaders also visited Ukraine on Friday to try to help end the nearly 16-month-old war.
The African leaders then traveled to St. Petersburg on Saturday to meet with Putin who was attending Russia’s showpiece international economic forum.
Details about the delegation’s proposals were thin. The three-hour meeting that the Africans’ peace plan consisted of 10 elements “was not formulated on paper.”
“The peace initiative proposed by African countries is very difficult to implement, difficult to compare positions,” Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov said. But “President Putin has shown interest in considering it.”
Putin had praised the delegation’s “balanced” approach and said he was “open to a constructive dialogue with all those who want to implement peace based on the principles of justice and respect for the parties’ legitimate interests”.
“He spoke about our position. Not all provisions can be correlated with the main elements of our position, but this does not mean that we do not need to continue working,” Peskov said.
“The main conclusion, in my opinion, from today’s conversation is that our partners from the African Union have shown an understanding of the true causes of the crisis that was created by the West, and have shown an understanding that it is necessary to get out of this situation on the basis of addressing these underlying causes,” Lavrov said.
Russia says that it was effectively forced to send troops into Ukraine because it was threatened by Ukraine’s desire to join NATO and by the country’s support from the United States and Western Europe.
Speaking at the economic forum on Friday, Putin declared that the first Russian tactical nuclear weapons have been deployed to Belarus, describing the move as a deterrent against Western efforts to defeat Russia in Ukraine. He previously said that the deployment would begin in July.
Asked if he could order the use of battlefield nuclear weapons in Ukraine, Putin said that there was no need for that but noted that Moscow could use its nuclear arsenals in case of a “threat to the Russian statehood.”
“In that case, we will certainly use all the means that the Russian state has. There should be no doubt about that,” he said.
The mission to Ukraine, the first of its kind by African leaders, comes in the wake of other peace initiatives — such as one by China — and carries particular importance for Africa, which relies on food and fertilizer deliveries from Russia and Ukraine. The war has impeded exports from one of the world’s most important breadbaskets.
“This conflict is affecting Africa negatively,” South African President Cyril Ramaphosa said at a news conference alongside Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy and four other African leaders after their closed-door talks on Friday.
Ramaphosa and others acknowledged the intensity of the hostilities but insisted all wars must come to an end and emphasized their willingness to help expedite that.
“I do believe that Ukrainians feel that they must fight and not give up. The road to peace is very hard,” he said, adding that “there is a need to bring this conflict to an end sooner rather than later.”
South Africa, Senegal and Uganda have avoided censuring Moscow over the conflict, while Egypt, Zambia and Comoros voted against Russia last year in a U.N. General Assembly resolution condemning Moscow’s invasion.
Many African nations have long had close ties with Moscow, dating back to the Cold War when the Soviet Union supported their anti-colonial struggles.
Speaking during Friday’s news conference, Comoros President Azali Assoumani floated the idea of a “road map” to peace, prompting questions from Zelenskyy who sought a clarification and insisted he didn’t want “any surprises” from their visit with Putin.
Chances for peace talks look dim as Ukraine and Russia take sharply different stands. Ukraine demands that Russia withdraws its troops from all its occupied territories as a condition for peace talks. The Kremlin, in turn, wants Ukraine to recognize the Crimean Peninsula, which Moscow illegally annexed from Ukraine in 2014, as part of Russia and acknowledge other land gains it has made.
China presented its own peace proposal at the end of February. Ukraine and its allies largely dismissed the plan, as the warring sides look no closer to a cease-fire.
The African peace mission comes as Ukraine launches a counteroffensive to dislodge the Kremlin’s forces from occupied areas, using Western-supplied advanced weapons in attacks in several sections of more than the 1,000-kilometer (600-mile) front line.
In the village of Blahodatne, taken by Ukrainian forces in the counteroffensive six days ago, soldiers said they have orders to keep advancing and not retreat, indicating long grueling battles ahead in the direction where Russians have built up dense lines of fortifications.
“Morale is really strong because the guys know they’re moving forward to liberate their lands,” said a Ukrainian soldier with the callsign Skripal (Violinist). “We have an order not to retreat and to move forward, so we’re trying.”
Village roads are punctured with craters, buildings are caved in and bullet holes peppered nearly every residence. Inside a cultural center, a Ukrainian commander with the call sign “Lermontov” said that they’d captured many Russian soldiers during the liberation of the village and showed journalists four bodies whom he said were Russian fighters who had been recruited from prisons.
Moscow has in the past repeated that any negotiations would need to take into account “new territorial realities”.
Zelensky, speaking on Friday after Ramaphosa called for de-escalation following their talks in Kyiv, repeated his position that Ukraine must recover territories lost to Russia to achieve peace.
When an air raid siren sounded in Kyiv shortly after the delegation’s arrival earlier on Friday, forcing it to take shelter, Zelensky said it showed that Putin either did not control his army or was “irrational”.
Some analysts said that efforts to secure peace appeared increasingly perilous, with both Kyiv and Moscow convinced they can win on the battlefield.
Ukraine launched a counteroffensive earlier this month.
Russian officials — including Putin — have insisted the counteroffensive is failing despite Kyiv saying it has claimed some gains.
Kyiv said Friday (June 16) evening that its units were having “tactical success” in nearly all areas where they were fighting in the south.
The Russian army, meanwhile, said it had repelled all assaults from Ukraine.
Securing the future viability of a deal allowing grain from Ukraine to reach the global market would be one potential goal of the delegation.
“This war is having a negative impact on the African continent and indeed on many other countries around the world,” Ramaphosa said ahead of formal talks with the Russian president.
Putin said “the crisis on the global food market is by no means a consequence” of the Ukraine conflict.
Russia accuses the West of blocking its exports of fertilisers and threatens to pull out of a deal — due to expire on July 17 — that has allowed Ukrainian grain exports to resume through the Black Sea.
A UNCA report showed that between 2018 and 2020, Africa imported 32% of its wheat from the Russian Federation and another 12% from Ukraine.
“We do not believe that shipments of Ukrainian grain supplies can solve the problems of poverty and hunger,” Putin said during the meeting.
Zelensky had asked the African leaders to “please, let them release our political prisoners. I think this will be an important result of your mission.”
Referring to prisoners of war, Putin said on Saturday (June 17): “We are ready to continue this process.”
In Ukraine, Russian and Ukrainian officials in the area devastated by flooding from the destruction of a Russian-held dam announced revised death tolls Saturday.
The toll in Russian-held areas had risen to 29, officials there said.
Kyiv said the number killed in its territory had risen to 16, with 31 still missing, and warned that the threat of air strikes “remains high across Ukraine”.
“The enemy continues to focus its main efforts on the Lyman, Bakhmut, Avdiivka, and Maryinka axes and heavy battles continue,” the Ukrainian defence ministry said in a statement.
In Washington, US President Joe Biden said that the United States would not make special arrangements for Ukraine to join the NATO military alliance.
“They’ve got to meet the same standards,” he told reporters. “So we’re not going to make it easy.”
Next week, British Prime Minister Rishi Sunak will call on investors and businesses at a two-day summit in London to match Ukraine’s “bravery on the battlefield” with support to get the country back on its feet.