2023-07-19 18:37:20
Russian President Vladimir Putin (left) and South African President Cyril Ramaphosa (right) before a meeting with a delegation of African leaders at Constantine Palace in Strelna near St Petersburg on June 17 2023. RAMIL SITDIKOV / AFP
After months of speculation, South Africa and Russia have finally put an end to the psychodrama that haunted Pretoria ahead of the BRICS (acronym for Brazil, Russia, India, China and South Africa) summit, which is due to take place from August 22 to 24 in Johannesburg. “By mutual agreement, President Vladimir Putin will not attend the summit”, announced the South African presidency in a statement on Wednesday, July 19. The spokesman for the Russian presidency, Dmitry Peskov, for his part, indicated that Mr. Putin would take part virtually, which amounted, according to him, to “full participation”. In Johannesburg, Russia will be represented by its foreign minister, Sergey Lavrov.
The case has embarrassed South Africa since the International Criminal Court (ICC) issued an arrest warrant in March for Vladimir Putin, a war crime suspect in the deportation of Ukrainian children. to Russia. A signatory to the Rome Statute, South Africa is required to apply the decisions of the ICC, which theoretically obliges it to arrest the Russian president if he sets foot on its soil.
But the South African authorities were torn between their international commitments and their proximity to Moscow. “Russia has made it clear that any arrest of its sitting president would amount to a declaration of war. It would not be consistent with our Constitution to risk engaging the country in a war with Russia.”, also defended the South African head of state, Cyril Ramaphosa, in a sworn statement to justice in June. The court had been seized by the country’s main opposition party, the Democratic Alliance (DA), which was seeking to ensure the arrest of Vladimir Putin if he came to the country.
” Two weights, two measures “
On several occasions in recent months, the African National Congress, the party in power in South Africa since the end of apartheid, had on the contrary made it known that Vladimir Putin would be welcome if it was up to him. For many years, the party has denounced the ” Two weights, two measures “ of the ICC, whom he criticizes in particular for having never launched proceedings once morest American President George W. Bush or British Prime Minister Tony Blair for having waged the war in Iraq.
In 2015, South African authorities refused to execute an ICC arrest warrant once morest Sudanese President Omar Al-Bashir. The government then explained that the immunity of a head of state in office prohibited him from proceeding to his arrest. Disavowed by a South African court, the authorities had finally exfiltrated the Sudanese president in a hurry. This precedent made it difficult to reproduce such acrobatics with Vladimir Putin.
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