Africa Business

Russia faced mounting diplomatic pressure Tuesday to end its war in Ukraine, as G20 allies and critics alike rued the painful global impact of nearly nine months of conflict.

A draft communique obtained by AFP showed the world’s 20 leading economies coming together to condemn the war’s effects, but still divided on apportioning blame.

The summit has shown that even Russia’s allies have limited patience with a conflict that has inflated food and energy prices worldwide and raised the spectre of nuclear war.

Risking diplomatic isolation, Russia was forced to agree that the “war in Ukraine” — which Moscow refuses to call a war — has “adversely impacted the global economy”.

It also agreed that “the use or threat of use of nuclear weapons” is “inadmissible”, after months of President Vladimir Putin making such threats.

The embattled Russian leader has skipped the summit, staying at home to reckon with a string of embarrassing battlefield defeats and a grinding campaign that threatens the future of his regime.

Rubbing salt in Russia’s wounds, Ukrainian leader Volodymyr Zelensky — fresh from a visit to liberated Kherson — delivered an impassioned video appeal to G20 leaders.

Zelensky told leaders from China’s Xi Jinping to America’s Joe Biden that they could “save thousands of lives” by pressing for a Russian withdrawal.

“I am convinced now is the time when the Russian destructive war must and can be stopped,” he said, sporting his now-trademark army-green T-shirt.

Putin’s delegate, Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov, whose summit preparation was disrupted by two hospital health checks for an undiagnosed ailment, remained in the room throughout Zelensky’s address, diplomatic sources said.

His most notable diplomatic victory was an acknowledgement in the communique that while “most members” of the G20 condemned Putin’s invasion, “there were other views and different assessments”.

Leaders must now sign off on the final text before the summit ends on Wednesday. 

“All problems are with the Ukrainian side, which is categorically refusing negotiations and putting forward conditions that are obviously unrealistic,” Lavrov told reporters.

The foreign minister had a dinner with leaders before departing on Tuesday.

– ‘Immense’ suffering –

The United States and its allies used the summit to broaden the coalition against Russia’s invasion and scotch Moscow’s claims of a war of East versus West.

Many “see Russia’s war in Ukraine as the root source of immense economic and humanitarian suffering in the world”, said a senior US official.

Russia’s G20 allies China, India and South Africa refrain from publicly criticising Putin’s war, and the draft joint statement is replete with diplomatic fudges and linguistic gymnastics.

But it gives a growing sense of the worldwide impact of the war.

G20 members Argentina and Turkey are among the nations worst hit by food inflation worldwide, but there was scarcely a country around the table unaffected.

“The war is affecting everyone,” said Argentine Foreign Minister Santiago Cafiero. 

“In the northern hemisphere the merchants of death broker lethal arms sales, but in the southern hemisphere food is costly or scarce — what kills are not bullets or missiles, but poverty and hunger.”

There was also a hint at growing Chinese unease with Russia’s prosecution of the war when presidents Xi and Biden met late Monday.

“It’s clear that the Russians are very isolated,” said one Western official. “I think some countries engaged with Russia but… I did not see any gestures of great solidarity.”

– Grain corridor –

A deal expiring Saturday that allows Ukraine to export grain through the Black Sea is a focus of summit conversations, with leaders expected to urge its “full, timely and continued implementation”.

Ukraine is one of the world’s top grain producers, and the Russian invasion blocked 20 million tonnes of grain in its ports before the United Nations and Turkey brokered the deal in July.

The summit build-up focused heavily on Xi, who is making only his second overseas trip since the pandemic began and has stolen the spotlight as leaders line up to speak with him.

Xi and Biden cooled Cold War rhetoric during three hours of talks on Monday, taking some of the heat out of their simmering rivalry.

“The world expects that China and the United States will properly handle the relationship,” Xi told Biden.

Former US diplomat Danny Russel described the meeting as broadly positive. 

“We should beware of prematurely declaring the strategic rivalry over. However, we saw a deliberate effort to stabilise a dangerously overheated relationship.”

Ethiopia’s Prime Minister Abiy Ahmed vowed on Tuesday to fulfil commitments made in a landmark peace deal with Tigrayan rebels and make “our promise a reality”, nearly two weeks after the agreement was signed.

The deal inked in South Africa on November 2 called for the disarming of the Tigray People’s Liberation Front (TPLF) and the restoration of aid to Tigray, which has been in the grip of a severe humanitarian crisis since the war broke out two years ago.

On Saturday, the warring sides agreed to facilitate immediate humanitarian access to “all in need” in Tigray and neighbouring regions in northern Ethiopia, following talks in Kenya’s capital Nairobi to discuss implementation of the peace deal.

Responding to questions from lawmakers in Ethiopia’s capital Addis Ababa, Abiy said: “We have discussed and signed (the agreement), what is expected from us next is executing the promise we made dutifully.”

“Because of lack of trust and inability to execute what was promised, negotiations flounder,” he warned.

A Twitter post by his office later quoted him saying: “We must keep our word by making our promise a reality. We must work hard to avoid problems during the process.”

Observers have pointed to many challenges ahead, including the resumption of aid and the thorny question of Western Tigray, a contested region which has been occupied by pro-Abiy Amhara militias since the war erupted.

The peace deal does not mention the region, raising fears of further conflict down the road. But Abiy said the issue could be resolved through constitutional means, including a possible referendum.

“We did not go to Pretoria to debate whether Wolkait (in Western Tigray) belongs to Amhara or Tigray as it is neither the place nor the time,” he told lawmakers.

The region is claimed by Tigrayans and Amharas.

International pressure for a ceasefire had been mounting since intense fighting reignited in northern Ethiopia in late August after a five-month truce, with pro-government forces capturing a number of key towns in Tigray.

The conflict between the TPLF and pro-Abiy forces — which include regional militias and the Eritrean army — has caused an untold number of deaths, forced more than two million people from their homes and driven hundreds of thousands to the brink of famine.

Tigray has been suffering from a severe lack of food and medicine, as well as limited access to basic services including electricity, banking and communications.

The war in Africa’s second most populous country began in November 2020 when Abiy sent troops into Tigray, accusing the TPLF of attacking federal army camps.

The TPLF had dominated national politics for nearly three decades until Abiy took office in 2018.

Nigeria’s famed Benin bronzes — artefacts stolen during British colonial rule and scattered across the globe — have a new online archive that aims to become a digital record of the treasures.

Thousands of 16th to 18th century metal plaques, sculptures and objects were looted from the ancient Kingdom of Benin and ended up in museums and with art collectors across the US and Europe. Many experts hail them as the zenith of African art.

As Nigeria negotiates their return, “Digital Benin” (https://digitalbenin.org/) provides a centralised hub of images and descriptions of more than 5,000 artefacts held in 131 institutions around the world.

“It is unique, new possibility to see all the objects together and to compare them,” Barbara Plankensteiner, director of Germany’s MARKK museum and one of the project’s founders, told AFP.

“It is really helpful for research for Nigerian scholars to be able to access knowledge they had not been able to before.”

The project, which began planning and research two years ago, was launched at an official event at the weekend in Benin City, in southern Nigeria’s Edo State, the heart of the former Benin Kingdom.

The platform contains a vast collection of images and details of artefacts categorised by the type of object from figureheads to shields and ceremonial roosters.

It details all the institutions where artefacts are held, from the British Museum with more than 900 objects to places like Toledo Museum of Art which has just one commemorative Queen Mother head statue.

Readers can also scroll through the story of the Benin Kingdom, its royalty, its chiefs and festivals, with a special section dedicated to oral history.

The project comes online as international momentum grows for the restoration of African artefacts from former colonial powers Britain, France, Germany and Belgium.

Nigeria’s neighbour Benin earlier this year inaugurated an exhibition of artworks and treasures returned by France after two years of negotiations.

Those 26 pieces were stolen in 1892 by French colonial forces from the capital of the former Kingdom of Dahomey.

Germany is in the process of returning hundreds of Benin Bronze artefacts to Nigeria, where a new museum is being built in Benin City to house artefacts.

Many of the artefacts were originally taken in 1897, when a British military expedition attacked and destroyed Benin City, looting thousands of metal and ivory sculptures and carvings.

“These are our properties,” Edo State Governor Godwin Obaseki said at the event to open the platform. “They were taken from us and they should be returned to us.”

The Kingdom of Benin, which despite its name was located in what is now southwestern NIgeria, traces its roots back to the first century BC.

It expanded through military conquest and commerce, which with the arrival of Europeans in the 16th century developed into trade in slaves, ivory and spices.

Russia faced mounting diplomatic pressure Tuesday to end its war in Ukraine, as G20 allies and critics alike rued the painful global impact of nearly nine months of conflict.

A draft communique obtained by AFP showed the world’s 20 leading economies coming together to condemn the war’s effects, but still divided on apportioning blame.

The summit has shown that even Russia’s allies have limited patience with a conflict that has inflated food and energy prices worldwide and raised the spectre of nuclear war.

Risking diplomatic isolation, Russia was forced to agree that the “war in Ukraine” — which Moscow refuses to call a war — has “adversely impacted the global economy”.

It also agreed that “the use or threat of use of nuclear weapons” is “inadmissible”, after months of President Vladimir Putin making such threats.

The embattled Russian leader has skipped the summit, staying at home to reckon with a string of embarrassing battlefield defeats and a grinding campaign that threatens the future of his regime.

Rubbing salt in Russia’s wounds, Ukrainian leader Volodymyr Zelensky — fresh from a visit to liberated Kherson — delivered an impassioned video appeal to G20 leaders.

Zelensky told leaders from China’s Xi Jinping to America’s Joe Biden that they could “save thousands of lives” by pressing for a Russian withdrawal.

“I am convinced now is the time when the Russian destructive war must and can be stopped,” he said, sporting his now-trademark army-green T-shirt.

Putin’s delegate, Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov, whose summit preparation was disrupted by two hospital health checks for an undiagnosed ailment, remained in the room throughout Zelensky’s address, diplomatic sources said.

His most notable diplomatic victory was an acknowledgement in the communique that while “most members” of the G20 condemned Putin’s invasion, “there were other views and different assessments”.

“All problems are with the Ukrainian side, which is categorically refusing negotiations and putting forward conditions that are obviously unrealistic,” Lavrov told reporters.

Leaders must now sign off on the final text before the summit ends on Wednesday. 

– ‘Immense’ suffering –

The United States and its allies used the summit to broaden the coalition against Russia’s invasion and scotch Moscow’s claims of a war of East versus West.

Many “see Russia’s war in Ukraine as the root source of immense economic and humanitarian suffering in the world”, said a senior US official.

Russia’s G20 allies China, India and South Africa refrain from publicly criticising Putin’s war, and the draft joint statement is replete with diplomatic fudges and linguistic gymnastics.

But it gives a growing sense of the worldwide impact of the war.

G20 members Argentina and Turkey are among the nations worst hit by food inflation worldwide, but there was scarcely a country around the table unaffected.

“The war is affecting everyone,” said Argentine Foreign Minister Santiago Cafiero. 

“In the northern hemisphere the merchants of death broker lethal arms sales, but in the southern hemisphere food is costly or scarce — what kills are not bullets or missiles, but poverty and hunger.”

There was also a hint at growing Chinese unease with Russia’s prosecution of the war when presidents Xi and Biden met late Monday.

“It’s clear that the Russians are very isolated,” said one Western official. “I think some countries engaged with Russia but… I did not see any gestures of great solidarity.”

– Grain corridor –

A deal expiring Saturday that allows Ukraine to export grain through the Black Sea is a focus of summit conversations, with leaders expected to urge its “full, timely and continued implementation”.

Ukraine is one of the world’s top grain producers, and the Russian invasion blocked 20 million tonnes of grain in its ports before the United Nations and Turkey brokered the deal in July.

The summit build-up focused heavily on Xi, who is making only his second overseas trip since the pandemic began and has stolen the spotlight as leaders line up to speak with him.

Xi and Biden cooled Cold War rhetoric during three hours of talks on Monday, taking some of the heat out of their simmering rivalry.

“The world expects that China and the United States will properly handle the relationship,” Xi told Biden.

Former US diplomat Danny Russel described the meeting as broadly positive. 

“We should beware of prematurely declaring the strategic rivalry over. However, we saw a deliberate effort to stabilise a dangerously overheated relationship.”

Malcolm Bidali, a Kenyan security guard expelled from Qatar after complaining about working conditions, is feeling conflicted about watching the World Cup that starts this week.

“Saying that I won’t watch the World Cup would be a lie,” the 30-year-old said.

“But looking at the stadiums, I can’t help but wonder how many people have not been paid, how many have suffered terrible working conditions… how many have lost their lives.”

Bidali became an outspoken activist for migrant workers after being held for four weeks and then expelled from the Gulf state in 2021.

Qatar has faced widespread criticism over its treatment of foreign workers, rights for women and the LGBTQ community in the runup to the tournament to end on December 18.

Rights groups have complained about unpaid wages and unreported deaths on construction sites.

Qatar has carried out major reforms that have been praised by international unions but Bidali is among the doubters.

“When all the cameras have left, all the journalists have left, all the fans have left, it will be the migrant workers and employers and the state, and I believe it will be very difficult to keep even the already introduced reforms, leave alone introducing new ones,” said Bidali.

“But I hope I am wrong.”

– ‘Similar to slavery’ –

Bidali arrived in Qatar in January 2016 and worked as a security guard watching images from CCTV cameras on a screen for 12 hours a day.

He had no complaints about his conditions. He earned about $420 a month — a lot more than he would in Kenya — and lived in a villa with other migrant workers. 

Bidali said his nightmare started when he moved to another company where he was only paid $350 a month and moved into a 20-square-metre room which he shared with five other men.

The beds, he said, were infested with lice and the kitchen with cockroaches. 

Bidali said he owed $1,200 to a Kenyan recruiting agency — which helped him get his job and organise a flight and visa — so at first said nothing.

But he eventually wrote email complaints to Qatar’s labour and interior ministries. According to Bidali, they did not reply.

Then Migrant-Rights.org, a specialist non-government group, contacted him and he started writing anonymous blogs about the lives of labourers in the wealthy Gulf state. 

“Working conditions in Qatar are similar to slavery,” he said.

“You find yourself in a situation that is very difficult to come out of, where someone basically owns you. Someone decides very big aspects of your life, from what time you wake up to what time you go to sleep, what type of food you eat, where you live, who you associate with.”

– ‘Psychological pressure’ –

The so-called “kafala” sponsorship system for foreign workers used to dominate in Qatar as it still does in most Gulf states.

But it has been largely dismantled in recent years. Workers can now change jobs and leave the country without the permission of their employer.

Qatar also introduced a minimum wage and new regulations on working in heat.

Bidali said he started to have problems when he wrote a story that mentioned a member of Qatar’s royal family. 

He was detained by the national security agency on May 4, 2021 and said he was not allowed to see a lawyer. He also complained of “psychological pressure” including having a permanent light in his cell and losing track of the day and time.

Qatar accused him of receiving money from a “foreign agent” to take part in spreading “misinformation”, but he was eventually freed following protests from the NGO and the professional footballers’ union.

He was banned from the leaving the country, but following international publicity and diplomatic support was expelled in August 2021 after being ordered to pay a $6,000 fine.

The Qatari authorities would not respond to Bidali’s latest comments. In May they said that he had received “legal advice and representation”.

Russia faced mounting diplomatic pressure to end its war in Ukraine Tuesday, as G20 leaders meeting in Indonesia rued the high cost of the eight-month-old conflict.

In a draft communique, countries including Russia deplored the impact of “the war in Ukraine” — a conflict that “most members strongly condemned”.

The group is also expected to declare that “the use or threat of use of nuclear weapons” is “inadmissible”, a veiled rebuke of President Vladimir Putin who has repeatedly raised the spectre of nuclear conflagration.

Putin was forced to skip the summit as he reckons with a string of embarrassing battlefield defeats and a grinding war that threatens the future of his regime.

Rubbing salt in his wounds, Ukrainian leader Volodymyr Zelensky — fresh from a visit to liberated Kherson — delivered an impassioned video appeal to G20 leaders.

Zelensky told leaders from China’s Xi Jinping to America’s Joe Biden that they could “save thousands of lives” by pressing for a Russian withdrawal.

“I am convinced now is the time when the Russian destructive war must and can be stopped,” he said, sporting his now-trademark army-green T-shirt.

Putin’s delegate, Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov, remained in his seat throughout Zelensky’s address, two diplomatic sources told AFP.

The veteran diplomat had preparations for the summit disrupted by two trips to a Bali hospital in as many days for an undisclosed ailment.

– ‘Immense’ suffering –

The United States and its allies sought to use the summit to broaden the coalition against Russia’s invasion and scotch Moscow’s claims of a war of East versus West.

Many “see Russia’s war in Ukraine as the root source of immense economic and humanitarian suffering in the world” said a senior US official.

Russia and its G20 allies China, India and South Africa refrained from criticising Putin’s war explicitly, and the draft joint statement is replete with diplomatic fudges and linguistic gymnastics.

But it gives a growing sense of the worldwide impact of the war.

G20 members Argentina and Turkey are among the nations worst hit by food inflation worldwide, but there was scarcely a country around the table unaffected by high food and fuel prices.

“The war is affecting everyone” said Argentine Foreign Minister Santiago Cafiero. 

“In the northern hemisphere the merchants of death broker lethal arms sales, but in the southern hemisphere food is costly or scarce — what kills are not bullets or missiles, but poverty and hunger.”

There was also a hint at growing Chinese unease with Russia’s prosecution of the war 

when presidents Xi and Biden met late Monday.

Both men voiced opposition to the “use or threat of use” of nuclear weapons in Ukraine, the White House said, although Beijing did not repeat that concern in public.

“It’s clear that the Russians are very isolated,” said one Western official. “I think some countries engaged with Russia but… I did not see any gestures of great solidarity.”

– Grain corridor –

A deal allowing Ukraine to export grain through the Black Sea was another focus of conversation.

It expires November 19, and Russia has already threatened to rip it up.

Ukraine is one of the world’s top grain producers, and the Russian invasion had blocked 20 million tonnes of grain in its ports before the United Nations and Turkey brokered the deal in July.

The G20 is expected to urge “full, timely and continued implementation”.

The summit build-up focused heavily on Xi, who is making only his second overseas trip since the pandemic began.

Xi and Biden cooled Cold War rhetoric during three hours of talks on Monday, taking some of the heat out of their simmering superpower rivalry. 

“The world expects that China and the United States will properly handle the relationship,” Xi told Biden.

Former US diplomat Danny Russel described the meeting as broadly positive. 

“We should beware of prematurely declaring the strategic rivalry over. However, we saw a deliberate effort to stabilise a dangerously overheated relationship.”

A baby born somewhere on Tuesday will be the world’s eight billionth person, according to a projection by the United Nations.

“The milestone is an occasion to celebrate diversity and advancements while considering humanity’s shared responsibility for the planet,” UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres said in a statement.

The UN attributes the growth to human development, with people living longer thanks to improvements in public health, nutrition, personal hygiene and medicine. 

It is also the result of higher fertility rates, particularly in the world’s poorest countries — most of which are in sub-Saharan Africa — putting their development goals at risk.

– How many is too many? –

Population growth has also magnified the environmental impacts of economic development.

But while some worry that eight billion humans is too many for planet Earth, most experts say the bigger problem is the overconsumption of resources by the wealthiest people.

“Some express concerns that our world is overpopulated,” said United Nations Population Fund chief Natalia Kanem. “I am here to say clearly that the sheer number of human lives is not a cause for fear.”

Joel Cohen of Rockefeller University’s Laboratory of Populations told AFP the question of how many people Earth can support has two sides: natural limits and human choices.

Our choices result in humans consuming far more biological resources, such as forests and land, than the planet can regenerate each year. 

The overconsumption of fossil fuels, for example, leads to more carbon dioxide emissions, responsible for global warming.

“We are stupid. We lacked foresight. We are greedy. We don’t use the information we have. That’s where the choices and the problems lie,” said Cohen. 

However, he rejects the idea that humans are a curse on the planet, saying people should be given better choices.

– Slowing growth –  

The current population is more than three times higher than the 2.5 billion global headcount in 1950.

However, after a peak in the early 1960s, the world’s population growth rate has decelerated dramatically, Rachel Snow of the UN Population Fund told AFP.

Annual growth has fallen from a high of 2.1 percent between 1962 and 1965 to below 1 percent in 2020.

That could potentially fall further to around 0.5 percent by 2050 due to a continued decline in fertility rates, the United Nations projects.

The UN projects the population to continue growing to about 8.5 billion in 2030, 9.7 billion in 2050, and peaking around 10.4 billion in the 2080s.

Other groups have, however, calculated different figures.

The US-based Institute for Health Metrics and Evaluation (IHME) estimated in a 2020 study that the global population would max out by 2064, without ever reaching 10 billion, and decline to 8.8 billion by 2100.

– Black Death – 

Since the emergence of the first humans in Africa over two million years ago the world’s population has ballooned, with only fleeting pauses to the increasing number of people sharing Earth.

Our ancestors were hunter-gatherers, who had few children compared to later settled populations in order to maintain their nomadic lifestyle.

The introduction of agriculture in the Neolithic era, around 10,000 BC, brought the first known major population leap.

With agriculture came sedentarization and the ability to store food, which caused birth rates to soar.

From around six million in 10,000 BC, the global population leapt to 100 million in 2,000 BC and then to 250 million in the first century AD, according to the French Institute for Demographic Studies.

As a result of the Black Death, the human population dropped between 1300 and 1400, from 429 to 374 million.

Other events, like the Plague of Justinian, which hit the Mediterranean over two centuries from 541-767, and the wars of the early Middle Ages in western Europe, also caused temporary dips in the number of humans on Earth.

From the 19th century on, the population began to explode, due largely to the development of modern medicine and the industrialization of agriculture, which boosted global food supplies.

Since 1800, the world’s population has jumped eight-fold, from an estimated one billion to eight billion.

The development of vaccines was key, with the smallpox jab particularly helping zap one of history’s biggest killers. 

Russia faced mounting diplomatic pressure to end its war in Ukraine Tuesday, as G20 leaders meeting in Indonesia rued the high cost of the eight-month-old conflict.

In a draft communique, countries including Russia deplored the impact of “the war in Ukraine” — a conflict that “most members strongly condemned”.

The group is also expected to declare that “the use or threat of use of nuclear weapons” is “inadmissible”, a veiled rebuke of President Vladimir Putin who has repeatedly raised the spectre of nuclear conflagration.

Putin was forced to skip the summit as he reckons with a string of embarrassing battlefield defeats and a grinding war that threatens the future of his regime.

Rubbing salt in his wounds, Ukrainian leader Volodymyr Zelensky — fresh from a visit to liberated Kherson — delivered an impassioned video appeal to G20 leaders.

Zelensky told leaders from China’s Xi Jinping to America’s Joe Biden that they could “save thousands of lives” by pressing for a Russian withdrawal.

“I am convinced now is the time when the Russian destructive war must and can be stopped,” he said, sporting his now-trademark army-green T-shirt.

Putin’s delegate, Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov, remained in his seat throughout Zelensky’s address, two diplomatic sources told AFP.

The veteran diplomat had preparations for the summit disrupted by two trips to a Bali hospital in as many days for an undisclosed ailment.

– ‘Immense’ suffering –

The United States and its allies sought to use the summit to broaden the coalition against Russia’s invasion and scotch Moscow’s claims of a war of East versus West.

Many “see Russia’s war in Ukraine as the root source of immense economic and humanitarian suffering in the world” said a senior US official.

Russia and its G20 allies China, India and South Africa refrained from criticising Putin’s war explicitly, and the draft joint statement is replete with diplomatic fudges and linguistic gymnastics.

But it gives a growing sense of the worldwide impact of the war.

G20 members Argentina and Turkey are among the nations worst hit by food inflation worldwide, but there was scarcely a country around the table unaffected by high food and fuel prices.

“The war is affecting everyone” said Argentine Foreign Minister Santiago Cafiero. 

“In the northern hemisphere the merchants of death broker lethal arms sales, but in the southern hemisphere food is costly or scarce — what kills are not bullets or missiles, but poverty and hunger.”

There was also a hint at growing Chinese unease with Russia’s prosecution of the war 

when presidents Xi and Biden met late Monday.

Both men voiced opposition to the “use or threat of use” of nuclear weapons in Ukraine, the White House said, although Beijing did not repeat that concern in public.

“It’s clear that the Russians are very isolated,” said one Western official. “I think some countries engaged with Russia but… I did not see any gestures of great solidarity.”

– Grain corridor –

A deal allowing Ukraine to export grain through the Black Sea was another focus of conversation.

It expires November 19, and Russia has already threatened to rip it up.

Ukraine is one of the world’s top grain producers, and the Russian invasion had blocked 20 million tonnes of grain in its ports before the United Nations and Turkey brokered the deal in July.

The G20 is expected to urge “full, timely and continued implementation”.

The summit build-up focused heavily on Xi, who is making only his second overseas trip since the pandemic began.

Xi and Biden cooled Cold War rhetoric during three hours of talks on Monday, taking some of the heat out of their simmering superpower rivalry. 

“The world expects that China and the United States will properly handle the relationship,” Xi told Biden.

Former US diplomat Danny Russel described the meeting as broadly positive. 

“We should beware of prematurely declaring the strategic rivalry over. However, we saw a deliberate effort to stabilise a dangerously overheated relationship.”

Indonesia’s President Joko Widodo on Tuesday urged G20 leaders to “end the war” as he opened a summit dominated by Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, with Washington and allies heaping pressure on Moscow.

“Being responsible means creating not zero-sum situations, being responsible here also means that we must end the war,” Widodo said.

The United States and its allies are looking to pin painfully high global food and fuel prices squarely at President Vladimir Putin’s door during the gathering.

Eyeing a joint G20 declaration that would condemn the eight-month-old invasion and threats to use nuclear weapons, US and European officials have painted the summit as evidence of Russia’s deepening isolation.

“I think you’re going to see most members of the G20 make clear that they condemn Russia’s war in Ukraine,” a senior US official said, speaking on condition of anonymity.

“Russia’s war of aggression is being condemned in the strongest possible terms,” the official said, adding that many “see Russia’s war in Ukraine as the root source of immense economic and humanitarian suffering in the world.”

It remained far from clear that Russia’s G20 allies China, India and South Africa would sign up to language that would condemn Putin’s war so explicitly.

Such a condemnation at the G20 would be a heavy diplomatic defeat for Moscow, which has been keen to paint opposition to the conflict as Western-dominated.

There was a hint at growing Chinese unease with Russia’s prosecution of the war though when presidents Xi Jinping and Joe Biden met late Monday.

Both men voiced opposition to the “use or threat of use” of nuclear weapons in Ukraine, the White House said.

European Council president Charles Michel signalled that while a draft agreement had been agreed to in principle, there was still work to be done.

“I am absolutely convinced that we should try to use the meeting today and tomorrow to convince all of the parties to put more pressure on Russia,” he told media as the summit opened.

-Inflation woes-

G20 leaders are gathered in Bali as soaring inflation drives millions more into poverty and tips several nations toward recession.

US allies hope to find common ground with G20 nations that, while cautious about denouncing Russia, are deeply concerned about rising prices.

G20 members Argentina and Turkey are among the countries worst hit by food inflation, while India and South Africa have avoided criticism of Moscow.

Putin is skipping the summit after a string of embarrassing battlefield defeats in a war that his supporters believed would be over in days.

Rubbing salt in the wound, Ukrainian leader Volodymyr Zelensky — fresh from a visit to liberated Kherson — addressed G20 leaders in a video message.

Russia is represented by Sergei Lavrov, despite the veteran foreign minister making two Bali hospital trips in as many days for an undisclosed ailment. 

Moscow denied the top diplomat had been hospitalised.

Lavrov is not seen as part of Putin’s inner circle — meaning the chance of a diplomatic breakthrough to end the war is vanishingly small.  

With Zelensky and Putin absent “there is little chance of any real peace diplomacy in Bali,” said Richard Gowan of the International Crisis Group. 

Still, French President Emmanuel Macron has kept an olive branch extended. He will call Putin after the G20 summit, according to a senior French official. 

– Grain corridor –

A deal allowing Ukraine to export grain through the Black Sea is likely to be another focus of conversation.

It expires November 19, and Russia has already threatened to rip it up.

United Nations Secretary-General Antonio Guterres said Monday he was “hopeful” the deal would be extended, calling it crucial for food security.

Ukraine is one of the world’s top grain producers, and the Russian invasion had blocked 20 million tonnes of grain in its ports before the United Nations and Turkey brokered the deal in July.

“We need urgent action to prevent famine and hunger in a growing number of places around the world,” Guterres said.

The summit build-up has focused on Xi, who is making only his second overseas trip since the pandemic.

He meets Tuesday with French President Emmanuel Macron and Australia’s Anthony Albanese, a day after a first presidential sitdown with Biden. 

The pair cooled Cold War rhetoric in a three-hour summit as they tried to take some of the heat out of their simmering superpower rivalry. 

“The world expects that China and the United States will properly handle the relationship,” Xi told Biden.

Former US diplomat Danny Russel described the meeting as broadly positive. 

“We should beware of prematurely declaring the strategic rivalry over. However, we saw a deliberate effort to stabilise a dangerously overheated relationship.”

Troops and rebels traded heavy fire in the Democratic Republic of Congo on Monday, a military source and local inhabitants said, as an envoy from the East African bloc called for all armed groups to “silence the guns”.

Government forces and the M23 militia were fighting in Kibumba, about 20 kilometres (12 miles) north of the strategic city Goma, the sources said, speaking by phone.

M23 fighters were also seen about 40 kilometres northwest of the city in the Virunga National Park, a wildlife haven famed for its mountain gorillas but which is also a hideout for armed groups, the sources said.

A mostly Congolese Tutsi group, the M23 — the March 23 Movement — leapt to prominence in 2012 when it briefly captured Goma before being driven out. 

After lying dormant for years, the rebels took up arms again in late 2021, claiming the DRC had failed to honour a pledge to integrate them into the army, among other grievances.

They have since won a string of victories against the military and captured swathes of territory, prompting thousands of people to flee their homes.

The resurgence has ratcheted up diplomatic tensions, with the DRC accusing its smaller neighbour Rwanda of backing the group.

Kinshasa expelled Rwanda’s ambassador at the end of last month as the M23 advanced, and recalled its own envoy from Kigali.

Rwanda denies providing any support for the M23 and accuses the Congolese army of colluding with the Forces for the Liberation of Rwanda (FDLR) — a notorious Hutu rebel movement involved in the 1994 genocide of Tutsis in Rwanda. 

“The Rwandan army and its allies from the M23 don’t stop, every passing day, launching assaults on our different positions in Kibumba,” lieutenant colonel Guillaume Ndjike, army spokesman for the eastern North Kivu province, told reporters.

Witnesses in the rebel-held town of Kiwanja also spoke last week of school canteens backed by World Food Programme being pillaged on Sunday and Monday. 

“There was corn flour and oil. They took these provisions as food rations,” a resident said.

Another said oil cans, flour sacks and beans had been taken away by truck the previous day.

– ‘Silence the guns’ –

Eastern DRC saw two bloody regional wars in the 1990s.

That conflict, along with the Rwandan genocide, bequeathed a legacy of scores of armed groups which remain active across the region but especially in North Kivu.

The heads of the seven-nation East African Community (EAC) on Sunday announced they would hold a “peace dialogue” on the region’s conflicts. 

“All groups that currently bear arms should lay those arms down and choose the path of peace through dialogue,” said EAC’s mediator, former Kenyan president Uhuru Kenyatta, on Monday. 

He arrived in Kinshasa the day before to hold consultations ahead of November 21 peace talks in Nairobi. 

“Silence the guns and join in a political process,” he urged local armed groups. 

To foreign groups, “the DRC is no longer the battleground for problems that are not from this country,” Kenyatta added. 

“There is nothing that can be gained through the barrel of a gun.”  

Another diplomatic path is being explored by Angolan President Joao Lourenco.

He met on Friday with Rwandan President Paul Kagame and on Saturday with Congolese President Felix Tshisekedi.