I saw YOU! – Newspaper Kommersant No. 210 (7411) dated 11/14/2022

On November 12 and 13, Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov held the East Asia Summit (EAS) in Phnom Penh, Cambodia’s capital. Special Correspondent “Kommersant” Andrey Kolesnikov tells why, at the plenary session on November 13, Sergey Lavrov was almost left in the hall without his key interlocutors, and most importantly, why everything suddenly changed so dramatically.

Sergey Lavrov’s plane was parked next to Joe Biden’s plane. And they flew to Cambodia for the East Asia Summit, which takes place as part of the ASEAN summit (it’s hard to explain, so it’s better to just believe), at about the same time. But this is the only thing that united them this morning.

Yes, this was the first summit in my memory (and she keeps a lot of superfluous things), where some of its participants came in order not to meet each other in any case. The second will be in Bali, at the G20.

In fact, the East Asia Summit is the countries that are members of ASEAN, that is, Brunei, Vietnam, Indonesia, Cambodia, Laos, Malaysia, Myanmar, Singapore, Thailand, the Philippines, plus the USA and Russia, Australia, India, China, South Korea, New Zealand and Japan.

“Maybe half of the unfriendly countries,” the Russian Foreign Minister was talking about the G20 countries while still on the plane. “But half of them are friendly! Some will be avoided, others not!

Then he waved it off, asking again:

Are they offering negotiations? Who are they”?!

“Well, how about it,” they asked him, “what about the Blinken formula?” (Anthony Blinken – US Secretary of State.— “b”.)

What is Blinken’s formula? Sergei Lavrov grimaced. “There is no Blinken formula or Biden formula!

– Well, is there Lavrov’s formula? I asked.

— Ah, it is! – he brightened up. – This is a chemical formula … You need to mix it … I’ll show you later … But in general, Lavrov’s formula is “the glass is rather half full, and not half empty.”

I thought I understood. This, apparently, is about friendly and unfriendly countries.

But still, I had one more question for the minister. A strange dash appeared in the script. On Sunday evening the plane flew from Cambodia to Bali. And that’s it, Monday is a dash in the schedule. What did it mean? Unannounced meetings? Aren’t they the ones you shouldn’t date?

– What are we doing on Monday? – Sergey Lavrov asked me again. – We are getting ready for Tuesday.

Meanwhile, in Phnom Penh, Sergei Lavrov had many meetings. Everything happened at the Sokha Phnom Penh hotel. It is there, right in the bend, where, merging, the jets of the Aragva and the Kura, that is, the Mekong and Tonle Sap, two super-rivers, flowed … Everything is very picturesque and, perhaps, even majestic.

The story was made a little more dramatic due to the fact that Ukrainian Foreign Minister Dmitry Kuleba came to the same summit.

What for? And Ukraine, apparently, is losing the status of a regional power, that is, it is becoming a world power, and is claiming membership in organizations in which it was difficult to imagine or even suspect it before, that is, Ukraine itself, it seems, too. But everything is changing rapidly.

On this day, Mr. Kuleba signed the Bali Treaty with the leadership of ASEAN, that is, he took the first step towards Ukraine, like Russia, becoming the same partner in dialogue with ASEAN, just like Russia with the United States. Moreover, the Minister of Foreign Affairs of Ukraine held bilateral meetings with colleagues from Brunei, Cambodia, Singapore, Thailand and the Philippines. Mr. Kuleba that day could be met everywhere in the hotel. It seemed that he was not only in all the meeting rooms, but if you open any hotel room, you will certainly meet Dmitry Kuleba there, rapidly changing his suit and embroidered shirt, in which he had just met with the ministers downstairs, into civilian clothes, that is, an ordinary shirt and jeans, as if he, having learned about the arrival of Mr. Lavrov, was going to leave, just in case, as unrecognized as possible through the service entrance.

And he was, of course, repeatedly noticed, and one could even write “captured” or at least intercepted, and more than once, by Channel One correspondent Ivan Prozorov, towards whom Mr. Kuleba nominated his hard-working assistant, who refused Ivan at least a couple of words first in English, and the second time, by the elevator, when Dmitry Kuleba even changed his glasses from a round frame to the usual square one, but it didn’t help anyway, already in very pure Russian. Well, yes, Ivan did not even stumble – he was used to it.

And what – Dmitry Kuleba felt calm behind the back of US President Joe Biden, who was also seen endlessly at the hotel that day. Mr. Biden even gave a press conference on the ground floor. Someone now believes that maybe it was not necessary, because this allowed the US president at the very beginning to thank Colombia for the exemplary organization of the summit, whose leadership, probably, shuddered and was delighted, because they did not make any special efforts to organize the summit, and it seemed that the US president needed a lot of effort to confuse Colombia and Cambodia.

And also say thank you that none of the journalists from the White House pool decided to clarify which summit, ASEAN or East Asia (and which one takes place within the framework, and why one, which by all indications is placed within the framework of the other, is so much wider in composition of participants …), the President of the United States has in mind, since such a question is broken here and not such bison of world diplomacy as US President Joe Biden. Although, on the other hand, in fairness, look for such bison.

Why did Joe Biden give a press conference in the very first hours of his arrival in Phnom Penh, without waiting not only for the end of his summit (the devil already knows what exactly; when I started writing this article half an hour ago, I seemed to have more understanding), but even its beginning, as is customary? And tears the canons.

So, Sergei Lavrov had his meetings. He first met his colleague from Indonesia, Ms. Retno Marsudi.

She was, like many here, wearing a mask, although covid restrictions in Cambodia had long since been lifted; but it seems that everyone here is constantly coughing meaningfully, and from this anxiety spreads around and at some point it’s just doom, described briefly by a formula associated with a horse or a stake.

Sergei Lavrov imperturbably suggested that Mrs. Marsudi take off his mask (for this he had to bend down to her, that is, bend literally into three deaths), and she promised, as soon as she crossed the threshold of the negotiation room, which means she would bypass the swarm of her own and other journalists, who even without covid only brings infection to good people.

Then there was the Minister of Foreign Affairs of Vietnam, Mr. Bui Thanh Son, the Minister of Foreign Affairs of Thailand, Mr. Don Pramatvinai … The meetings did not take much time: half an hour was enough for both sides to talk to the point of complete devastation.

Are the meetings going well? I seized the moment to ask Sergei Lavrov.

– Simply fantastic! he lit up.

The meeting with the Minister of Foreign Affairs of Laos, Mr. Salemsay Kommasit, was marked by the fact that he asked and answered in good Russian.

– How long have you been here? Sergey Lavrov asked knowingly.

“Yes, it’s been five days already…” Colleague Kommasit replied with a strange anguish in his voice.

Meanwhile, everyone was already gathering for a gala dinner in honor of one of the summits, and most were crowding in the hotel lobby. The women’s part of the United States delegation was distinguished by the evening dress. The entire delegation living, except for one person, in the same hotel, would not fit, it seemed, in any reasonable room (and the hotel, thanks to them, seemed like a human anthill, and not because Russian delegations also stayed in it and Ukraine; well, what, there are not so many hotels in Phnom Penh where you can and should stay), so American diplomats and diplomats selected themselves from among themselves for the gala dinner.

At the dinner, the leaders of the countries were seated at one straight table 70 meters long, and Sergey Lavrov was sitting second from the left, and Joe Biden was somewhere in the middle, so, fortunately for both of them, they did not manage to exchange even a word.

But the round tables, at which the members of the delegations were seated, turned out to be close, about ten meters from each other. (National Security Adviser to the President of the United States Jake Sullivan stood out with quickness at the American table. Behind ours, needless to say, the official representative of the Russian Foreign Ministry, Maria Zakharova, in a skirt – from Berta Muzis.) But even here everyone kept themselves in hand.

The next morning began with the plenary session of the East Asia Summit. The presidents of the EAC countries, one after another, slowly walked along the wide hall: all the same Indonesia, the Philippines, Laos …

Suddenly, I saw that Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau was moving in the opposite direction, just not pushing them with his shoulders, energetically and at the same time with a strange absent-minded smile on his face.

I wanted to ask how he got here, but it was better not to.

With the same success one could be interested, for example, why the ASEAN summit is referred to as No. 40 and No. 41, despite the fact that this is the same summit of the organization of the same name. They will begin to explain to you that both the opening ceremony and the closing ceremony count; and that this has nothing to do with covid at all, and they themselves will instantly get confused in these explanations, and there will be no need to help them in this.

A couple of minutes later, after Prime Minister Trudeau, the flag of his country was solemnly carried out of the hall.

Here Sergei Lavrov entered the hall. Well, everything became obvious: the leader of Canada, it seems, was informed that the Russian Foreign Minister was approaching him. And there was no president of the United States, and no. Apparently, they immediately did not want to be in his company.

Australian Prime Minister Anthony Albanese, in order to lose this society, did not even have to leave the hall: he did not have time to enter.

For a long time, about half an hour, they waited for the President of the United States. It was high time to close the corridor with the red carpet, but they hesitated. No, he didn’t. What happened came as a surprise even to the journalists of the White House pool: they, too, were parachuted to the entrance, and now they also shifted for some time in anticipation of their president.

In fact, at first glance, it all looked strange. The day before, at a gala dinner, nothing prevented Joe Biden from sitting at the same table with Sergey Lavrov and listening to his welcoming speech.

Apparently, the dinner, which was held in a format closed to the press, was not of such fundamental importance for the US president as the public plenary session.

It remained to be said that, as it turned out later, the UN Secretary-General, Mr. António Guterres, also left the hall quietly before the meeting.

What is he?

And then another big surprise happened. The President of the United States suddenly arrived. No one was waiting for him, of course. Whether he changed his mind, or was simply 45 minutes late, is not known for certain. He calmly entered the hall, sat down in the place allotted to him. Moreover, he was in time for Mr. Lavrov’s speech and listened to him completely, while at the same time he seemed completely unperturbed. Perhaps he just didn’t listen.

And then he showed up. And here already, probably, it was also possible not to listen to him, because it is completely clear what they could say and in the end said, first of all, about the attitude towards Ukraine, the Russian Foreign Minister and the President of the United States.

Although in fact, of course, they both listened. Otherwise, perhaps the final statement would have been adopted. But it was not accepted.

And Mr. Lavrov later, already at the airport, said that the positions on Ukraine between Russia and the “unfriendly” countries were somewhat different, so there really was no chance to accept the application.

Mr. Lavrov promised that in the communiqué, which will be issued by the current head of the East Asia Summit (that is, Prime Minister Hun Sen of Cambodia), all positions will be taken into account.

And soon it also turned out that the flag of Canada was taken out because it remained in the hall after the Canada-ASEAN summit, which was held there the day before. And Mr. Trudeau himself was not supposed to take part in the plenary session. It’s a pity in the end there was only an Australian prime minister. Apparently, they simply forgot to tell him that he could return.

Yes, it was now the only casualty of this great drama.

Andrey Kolesnikov, Phnom Penh