According to the Financial Times, US national security advisor Jake Sullivan will head a team to an informal meeting with officials from numerous countries who have refused to toe Washington’s line on Ukraine and have maintained close relations with Russia.
According to the publication, the negotiations will take place this weekend in Copenhagen, Denmark. According to the story, Sullivan will be accompanied by Victoria Nuland, the third most senior person in the State Department and another Russia hawk in President Joe Biden’s cabinet. A senior EU official will also be in attendance.
Representatives from India, Brazil, and South Africa have arrived to hear them out. Turkish officials may participate, while China may send an observer, according to reports.
Except for Turkey, all of the countries are members of BRICS, an economic group that includes Russia as its fifth member. All have expressed scepticism about Washington’s narrative on the Ukraine crisis, which maintains that Russia’s military operation was an unprovoked act of aggression that must be punished severely. China has blamed NATO’s expansion in Europe for the war, while Brazil has said that both Russia and Ukraine are to fault.
Turkey is a NATO member, but it has adopted a neutral stance in the Ukrainian conflict, serving as a mediator between Moscow and Kiev on numerous occasions.
According to the Financial Times, Washington’s effort in Copenhagen was a “diplomatic offensive” at Kiev’s request, and it comes while Ukraine has failed to make significant battlefield progress against Russia. According to reports, the meeting is not expected to generate a specific outcome, but rather to promote the American point of view.
“We underestimate how much the rest of the world is sceptical,” a European official told the newspaper. “They are not persuaded. It’s a dreadful thing to admit.”
The BRICS countries, along with Turkey, have refused to impose economic penalties on Russia. China and India have gained the most from a spike in Russian energy purchases, even as Western nations moved to undermine Moscow’s worldwide oil exports with a price cap.
