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South Africa is about to start joint naval training with Russia and China, despite complaints from US, European and even South African officials that it appears to be an endorsement of Russia’s war in Ukraine.
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By John Eligon
Johannesburg Report
JOHANNESBURG — Ships, sailors and infantrymen from Russia and China have begun arriving in South Africa for joint army training with a Russian warship with the letters Z and V, Russia’s patriotic symbols for its war in Ukraine, carrying what Russia claims is a hypersonic missile. .
At a time when many countries severed ties with Russia following its invasion of Ukraine, South Africa has been leaning toward its long-standing alliance with Moscow, leaving the United States and Europe outraged.
South African leaders have not apologized. The friendship between South Africa and Russia dates back to the struggle against apartheid. In recent months, the Russian vessel Lady R, an oil tanker under US sanctions, has been received off the South African coast. And the Russian foreign minister joked and smiled with his South African counterpart at a press conference.
“I am really proud that we have the right diplomatic relations with your country, that we are a valuable partner,” South African Foreign Minister Naledi Pandor said during the meeting with his Russian counterpart, Sergei V. Lavrov, in Pretoria.
The recent display of South Africa, the most evolved economy and influential voice of the African continent, has given Russia much importance, as its invasion of Ukraine has made it a pariah elsewhere.
South Africa gets an allied superpower that can help it increase its global influence. And South African officials also see an opportunity to help their country’s beleaguered economy through industry expansion with Russia, just as Moscow is for friendly nations to do business to circumvent the U. S. U. S. sanctions and European sanctions.
Mzuvukile Maqetuka, South Africa’s ambassador to Russia, told Russian media outlet Sputnik that the countries were discussing expanding investment in oil and hydropower and launching direct flights from Moscow to Cape Town.
The two countries have enjoyed warmth for 30 years because the Soviets supported the African National Congress, or ANC. – now the ruling party – in the struggle against apartheid.
But U. S. officials have sounded the alarm, accusing South African officials of offering curtains to Russia’s war effort by allowing the sanctioned ship, the Lady R, to dock. They warned that South Africa is opposed to helping Russia evade sanctions. The United States has a variety of sanctions, from cutting investment aid or industry privileges to enforcing sanctions.
The European Union, South Africa’s largest trading partner, is also involved in South Africa “moving further away from a non-aligned position,” said Peter Stano, the EU representative. Spokesman, he said in a statement.
South Africa denies helping Russia in the war. But the scrutiny underscores the delicate diplomatic dance of a medium-sized country seeking to reach out to several superpowers, alienating any of them. Within a week last month, the South African government hosted the U. S. Secretary of State. Finance, the Minister of Foreign Affairs of Russia and the ministers of the European Union.
“We don’t do one aspect over the other,” said Clayson Monyela, Chief Public Diplomacy at South Africa’s Department of Foreign Affairs. “Both are important. “
The extent to which South Africa is turning to Russia is part of Russian President Vladimir V’s strategy. Putin to become the leader of a global coalition of countries opposing Western domination.
Lavrov has already visited seven African countries this year. He presented Russia as the best friend of African countries in the face of “Western attempts to falsify history, to erase the reminiscence of the terrible crimes of the colonizers, adding genocide. “
Vadim Zaytsev, an expert on Russia’s African politics, wrote Tuesday that he sees a trite three-pronged strategy in St. Lavrov: arms exports and generation; open-air economic cooperation Western canals; and programs to publicize humanitarian and schooling projects in Russian.
When the invasion began on February 24 last year, Ms. Pandor’s ministry first called on Russia to withdraw from Ukraine. But South Africa has changed that position since then.
South Africa was one of 35 countries, 19 from Africa, that abstained in a United Nations vote last October to condemn Russia’s planned referendums on territory Russia had claimed to have seized in eastern Ukraine. Pandor, in his press conference with Mr. Lavrov, warned that Ukraine was a risk to Russia because of all the weapons it had obtained from the West.
South African government officials insist that South Africa is officially “non-aligned” in accordance with the principles of the Non-Aligned Movement, a coalition of more commonly small and medium-sized nations that emerged during the Cold War.
But a U. S. official was not allowed to do so. The U. S. government in South Africa said the U. S. government has been in the U. S. government. The U. S. believed that ammunition and rocket booster that Russia could use in the war in Ukraine could have been loaded onto the Russian tanker, Lady R, while docking in South Africa. The official, who spoke on condition of anonymity to discuss sensitive diplomatic issues, declined to provide evidence but said the United States is contemplating action against South Africa.
Monyela, of the South African Department of Foreign Affairs, is false.
“Anyone who makes this claim produces evidence because it’s very simple to claim that something happened and it would be very dangerous,” he said.
South Africa and Russia are already partners in the BRICS, an alliance they share with Brazil, India and China. The bloc, founded in 2001, has positioned itself as a competitor to Western-dominated alliances such as the G7 and a voice for the interests of smaller, emerging nations.
“There are leaders who now listen to the African people,” rather than dictating what they deserve to do, said Lindiwe Zulu, A. N. C. foreign affairs chair. “That’s how we feel when we’re at those BRICS meetings. We feel like partners in everything that is not imposed on us.
In terms of gross dollars, South Africa’s economy with Russia is dwarfed by its industry with the European Union, China or the United States. But South Africa’s connection to Russia is deeply emotional.
During the struggle against apartheid, the Soviet Union provided money, military training, and other bureaucracy to the African National Congress, the liberation movement that has become the ruling party. The U. S. government did not officially sanction those who opposed the apartheid regime until 1986, just a few years before the final fall of apartheid.
When Western countries blame Russia for invading Ukraine, South African officials hesitate to point to European colonial conquests in Africa and U. S. invasions of countries like Iraq and Afghanistan.
“Many European countries have even apologized for what they have done to Africa,” said Khulekani Skosana, national foreign affairs president for the A. N. C. Youth League. “Some of them continue to see us as subhuman. “
Mr Skosana has put his weight firmly on the Kremlin. He traveled to eastern Ukraine last year to act as an observer of widely condemned Russian referendums and compared Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky’s government to the apartheid regime.
One thing that can make the governments of South Africa and other countries on the continent love Russia is Moscow’s hands-off technique with the United States, which demands democratic reforms as situations for aid and trade, said Lauren Hess, a Washington-based foreign policymaker. analyst founded in South Africa.
“People are experiencing this while the United States dictates to South Africa,” Hess said.
The South African government’s affinity and political leaders with Russia would possibly be out of step with the prospects of the population as a whole. Recent polls have indicated that South Africans would rather live in Western countries than Russia, and that they see the influence of the United States in their country is more definite than that of Russia. A survey last year of Twitter posts in thirteen African countries, plus South Africa, showed most commonly indifferent or negative attitudes toward Russia, according to the South African Institute of International Studies. .
Critics in South Africa accuse heads of government of being trapped in nostalgia. They argue that the Kremlin is South Africa as a pawn in a foreign public relations exercise to erase Russia’s image.
After the Russian consulate posted on Twitter a photo of a warship along the coast of Cape Town, Geordin Hill-Lewis, the mayor and member of South Africa’s main opposition party, responded: “Cape Town will be complicit in Russia’s evil war. “
Critics also refute the narrative that Russia and Putin have natural intentions in Africa, pointing out that Russia sells weapons to African countries, has seized mining interests across the continent and deployed mercenaries, most commonly with the Wagner Group, a security firm. through a best friend of Putin, in several countries.
“Nothing about Moscow’s engagement in Africa inspires confidence,” Lindiwe Mazibuko, former leader of the Democratic Alliance, wrote in an op-ed in the Sunday Times. die. “
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Lynsey Chutel contributed reporting from Johannesburg and Anton Troyanovski from Berlin.
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