U.S. Boycott of G20 Meeting Is a Gift for Russia and China

Foreign ministers from the Group of 20 are meeting in Johannesburg today and tomorrow, marking the first major gathering of South Africa’s G20 presidency. U.S. Secretary of State Marco Rubio is boycotting the meeting amid tensions between the Trump administration and South Africa. (AP)

Our Take 

South Africa’s G20 presidency, culminating in the group’s next summit later this year, presents a significant opportunity for the interests of African countries to play a larger role in multilateralism and on the global diplomatic stage. That is especially true with the African Union now a formal member of the group. And South Africa’s chosen themes for its presidency-solidarity, equality and sustainability-represent some of the most pressing diplomatic matters for African countries and the Global South more broadly.

At the same time, though, South Africa’s G20 presidency is already being undermined by tensions with the United States and Rubio’s boycott of the foreign ministers’ meeting. Soon after returning to the White House, U.S. President Donald Trump froze all U.S. aid and assistance to South Africa, parroting talking points from his South African-born adviser Elon Musk that the country’s leadership is anti-white. Both have said, falsely, that South Africa is confiscating land from the country’s white Afrikaner minority and allowing violent attacks against white people.

Meanwhile, in his announcement that he would not attend this week’s gathering, Rubio characterized the themes of South Africa’s G20 presidency as “DEI and climate change,” underscoring how the domestic culture war targets of the Trump administration are bleeding over into U.S. foreign policy.

Now, Rubio’s boycott creates an opportunity for Russia and China-the foreign ministers of both are present at the gathering this week-to shore up their own relations with the emerging powers and Global South countries that have increasingly become arenas of great power competition.
That is especially true because Rubio’s criticism of South Africa’s G20 priorities has effectively positioned the U.S. in opposition to many Global South countries’ topline demands from the Global North. While “solidarity, equality and sustainability” are broad ideas, they represent specific issues that have become the diplomatic focus of many Global South countries, such as debt relief and funding for climate change mitigation and adaptation.

Put another way, in a competitive field for partnerships with the Global South, the U.S. is increasingly forfeiting entirely.

On Our Radar

Protesting farmers briefly clashed with police in Thessaloniki, Greece‘s second-largest city, yesterday as they demanded more government support on a number of issues, including crop losses due to climate change. Greek farming associations have been protesting for several weeks, particularly in central Greece.

The protests echo similar demonstrations that swept across Europe in the first half of last year, with farmers blocking motorways and capital cities to protest against environmental restrictions by the EU, in some cases for weeks at a time. As John Boyce wrote then, EU leaders’ uncharacteristic willingness to backtrack on key policies in response to the protests underscores growing concern about the populist far right’s ability to capitalize on farmers’ anger.

Some observers had hoped a coalition government would be better equipped to respond to South Africa’s deep-rooted challenges than the ANC was on its own. But as Chris O. Ògúnmọ́dẹdé wrote after the coalition deal was sealed in June, that optimism overlooked the deep, intractable differences that exist between the ANC and its coalition partners.