By Rabi Raj Thapa
When big and powerful countries decide, everything is possible. In contemporary political order, while some people suffer and die on the war front, their leaders become busy themselves and fly around in the name of peace conferences.
During armed conflict and thereafter, I had ample opportunity to attend hundreds of conferences and workshops to bring peace and stability to Nepal. Unfortunately, today, Nepal has neither peace nor stability.
Ukraine Peace Summit held in Switzerland has proved to be a mixed bag of Western agenda pushed to the world that it treats differently. NATO and EU’s narratives over Israel and West Europe vastly differ from their narratives over the Middle East, and Global South especially over Russia, China and Korea with less logical proportion.
First, the organizers’ decision to exclude the main warring party Russia looked like “a marriage ceremony without a bride”. Second, 84 participants out of 100 countries must have felt happier to be in Switzerland than to be serious about bringing out an effective workable outcome than to procrastinate and just sign the final communiqué.
When Saudi Arabia insisted on Russia’s participation, it affected the second session. American Vice-President Kamala Harris, French President Emmanuel Macron and Japanese Prime Minister Fumio Kishida left the Summit hall shortly after hours. Chief-host the Swiss President warned one country not to weaponize food security forgetting Israel doing the same in Gaza.
Most importantly BRICS member countries: India, Brazil and South Africa along with Saudi Arabia, United Arab Emirates, Armenia, Bahrain, Indonesia, Surinam, Thailand, Colombia, Libya, and Mexico opted not to sign because of agendas like ‘respect for Ukraine’s “territorial integrity” to end the war’ that is easy to understand.
When Russia did not get an invitation, China excused itself and opined that a Russian presence would have added to the value of the conference. But the question remains, how did a country like Switzerland fail to understand and work on such an issue like that?
German Chancellor Olaf Schulz also left the conference early. President of the European Union Ursula von der Leyen even declared Switzerland summit was not a peace negotiation and accused Putin is not serious about ending the war. If he and Zelenskyyare not serious then how and who will end the war? US President Biden slammed the Russian ceasefire formula for defying basic common sense and his National Security Advisor Jack Sullivan blamed Putin for defying the UN charter and even basic morality.
To counter all of them, Dmitry Peskov, Kremlin Spokesman and Security Advisor Kremlin countered, “The current dynamics of the situation on the front demonstrate it will continue to get worse for the Ukrainians. Putin is not rejecting anything. He is not rejecting the possibility of talks but he is seeking a legitimate constitutional body authorized to conduct negotiations. Negotiations are, as a rule, conducted only by experts and elected legitimate representatives”.
Anyway, the main hero of the Summit Volodymyr Zelenskyy proposed another follow-up meeting at the end of the Summit. He said, “The first and the second peace summits should unite our joint work on the details of peace; we are at war and don’t have time for prolonged work; moving to peace means acting fast. When the action plans for peace are ready…, the path will be opened for the second peace summit and ending the war for a just and lasting peace!”
The moral of the Story is that the rule of the game for leaders like Zelenskyy, Putin and Netanyahu is that they can be indifferent to any number of deaths and suffering of poor soldiers on the battlefield while they are obsessed with getting what they fantasize about. For Zelenskyy it can be NATO membership, for Netanyahu, it can be other. Zelenskyy looks always happy to fly around the world and speak at summits, assemblies, meetings and conferences as long as the world permits.
The views expressed in this article are the author’s own and do not necessarily reflect People’s Review’s editorial stance.
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