Russia receives the cold shoulder at Bali’s G20 summit

In the warmth of the Balinese sunshine, Russia has received an unsurprisingly frosty reception at the G20 summit. We are barely a few hours into the summit and the tension is already acute. The source of this tension, of course, is Russia’s invasion of Ukraine. 

This is the first G20 held since the beginning of the Ukraine war earlier this year. Ahead of the summit, some member states were already questioning whether Russia should still be allowed to retain its membership of the group. Meanwhile, in light of the war, Ukraine was invited to participate in this year’s summit as a guest. Perhaps in anticipation of this, it was announced last week that Russian president Vladimir Putin would not be attending. Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov has gone in his place.

Lavrov is the ghost at the feast. The Indonesian organisers of the G20 may have tried to avoid the subject of Russia’s war, and keep the focus on subjects such as the global economy and post-Covid recovery, but this has proved impossible.