Baskadia

The second edition of the Russia-Africa Summit was held in St. Petersburg between 27–28 July, 2023. The first summit was held in 2019 in Sochi, Russia, where heads of state of 43 out of the 54 African nations were present. This year, 17 heads of state were present at the summit from among the 49 confirmed attendees, while the remaining were represented by other high-ranking officials.

Russia blamed Western pressure for this but that is hardly the entire story. The concerns of African states about the Russia-Ukraine conflict can be deduced from the voting patterns at the United Nations (UN). In the emergency special session of the UN General Assembly on 2 March 2022, which called for Russia to immediately end its invasion, 28 of the 54 African countries voted in favour of the resolution. Eritrea voted against it while 16 abstained—the remaining nine votes were not recorded. Out of the 28 who voted for the resolution in March 2022, 26 decided not to send their heads of state to the second Russia-Africa Summit. The remaining two—Egypt and Libya—have significant links to Russia. In 2019, 19 of these 26 sent their heads of state to the Sochi Summit. Russia was under sanctions even then over its annexation of Crimea in 2014, so clearly the 2022 invasion marked a distinct shift in how these states perceive Russian actions and that they are opposed to it. This is to argue that the downgrading of attendance by some African countries is not simply a function of Western pressure but is also driven by their interpretation of the ongoing war. At the same time, there is no united African bloc opposed to Russia, given the differences in the voting pattern of the 54 states and the presence of only 17 heads of state at the Summit, as well as high-ranking officials (including prime ministers, vice presidents and cabinet-level ministers) from other states.