Indian Foreign Minister Subrahmanyam Jaishankar on March 2 briefed media on the G20 Foreign Ministers Meeting in Delhi, that the overwhelming majority of the “outcome document,” which might have been issued as a communiqué, was agreed upon by all ministers; and that this involved the issues of development, upon which host nation India was focused—and impoverishment of the Global South by the war in Ukraine. The implication his briefing conveyed was that insistence by some nations’ ministers on a denunciation of Russia, prevented a communiqué on urgent matters of development. Jaishankar said:
“Now, is the conflict impacting the Global South? Of course, it is. I mean, it’s not something new. In fact, we—India has been saying this very strongly for pretty much close to a year that, you know, this is affecting—In fact, today in my own session, I actually used the word—saying for much of the Global South, this is a make or break issue; that the cost of fuel, the cost of food, the cost of fertilizer, the availability of fertilizer, which means next year’s food—these are all extremely pressing issues. And if you see some of the countries who were already struggling with debt, who were already impacted by the pandemic, for them, this conflict, the knock-on effects of this conflict coming on top of that has been really—I mean, damaging is a very, very mild word.
“So it is a matter of very, very deep concern for us, which is why we have kept the focus in this meeting very much on the concerns of the Global South. We feel these are the most vulnerable countries. You know, it’s not realistic, it’s not credible to talk about the future of the global economy and the multilateral order if you are not able to really address and focus on the issues of those who are most in need. So that’s been broadly the approach.
“So just to sum up, I would say in terms of the outcome document, which we will be putting out very, very shortly, you will see that … the bulk there is … 95%—in terms of paragraphs— agreement, and it is just on two paragraphs that we were not able to get everybody on the same page.” (https://www.mea.gov.in/media-briefings.htm?dtl/36321/Transcript_of_Media_Briefing_by_Presidency_after_the_G20_Foreign_Ministers_Meeting_March_02_2023 )
