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Saudi Arabia has invited main developing nations to meet in a bid to win their backing for Ukraine, because the US and different western powers search to weaken world assist for Moscow’s full-scale invasion.
Senior officers from China, Brazil, South Africa and India — Russia’s companions within the BRICS grouping — have been invited to attend two-day talks in Jeddah subsequent weekend, alongside greater than 30 different states, in accordance to 4 individuals with information of the assembly. Russia has not been invited.
The gathering, a successor to similar meetings in Copenhagen last month, will strive to persuade international locations from South America, Africa and south-east Asia to again Ukraine’s peace plan, which calls for an finish to the struggle by reclaiming its territory at the moment occupied by Russian troops.
National safety advisers or their equivalents have been invited to attend the assembly, which comes amid intense fighting in southern Ukraine. Kyiv has to date made hard-fought however restricted good points in its summer season counteroffensive.
Other G20 members resembling Mexico, Indonesia and Argentina have been invited, in accordance to one of many individuals, alongside international locations which have supported Ukraine resembling Japan and South Korea. More than a dozen European international locations have been invited, alongside the EU itself, within the type of Brussels representatives.
The assembly, which was first reported by the Wall Street Journal, is the newest step by Saudi Arabia because it seeks to place itself as a peace dealer between Russia and Ukraine.
Riyadh has helped negotiate prisoner exchanges, labored to strike a deal to return Ukrainian children forcibly relocated to Russia, and provided itself as mediator.
It has stored up shut ties with Russia, with which it leads the Opec+ group of oil producers and exporters, however has additionally despatched monetary assist to Ukraine and hosted president Volodymyr Zelenskyy at an Arab League summit in May.
The kingdom has sought to place itself as a center energy with affect past its area, whereas balancing ties with the US, Russia and China. Acting as a mediator would show the effectiveness of that strategy, one individual accustomed to the Saudi authorities’s considering stated.
Western officers are conscious that the struggle is probably going to rumble on into subsequent yr and are eager to win over extra developing nations to Ukraine’s aspect. They consider that decreasing diplomatic assist for Moscow will assist to carry Russian president Vladimir Putin to the negotiating desk.
The US, EU and different western international locations have endorsed Zelenskyy’s peace plan, which calls for an entire withdrawal of Russian forces. Alternative proposals from China and different states are ambiguous about Russia’s retreat.
