Reuters: British Foreign Office opposed Russia’s participation in the G20 summit

Russia has no moral right to participate in the G20 summit while fighting continues in Ukraine, informs Reuters, citing a spokesman for the British Foreign Office.

“Russia has no moral right to sit in the G20 as long as its aggression in Ukraine continues,” he said.

At the same time, London welcomes the desire of Indonesia to discuss with Russia the consequences of a special military operation at the G20 meetings, as well as “signs that Ukraine may be represented by President Volodymyr Zelensky at the G20 leaders’ summit.”

The G20 summit will be held in Bali on November 15-16. Indonesian President Joko Widodo previously announced that the event will visit Russian President Vladimir Putin. Bloomberg wrote that if the Russian leader arrives at the summit, then his meeting with Zelensky, whom Widodo invited in April, is not ruled out. In August, Indonesian Ambassador to Russia Jose Tavares said that Indonesia was interested in organizing a meeting between the two presidents.

On Friday, British Prime Ministerial Candidate, Former Treasury Secretary Rishi Sunak urged to prevent Putin from meeting the G20 leaders, Sky News reported.

“We need to send a strong signal to Putin that there will be no place for him at the G20 table until he ends his illegal war in Ukraine,” the channel quoted a spokesman for the prime minister candidate as saying.

He also noted that the G20 had a collective responsibility to expose Putin’s “heinous behavior”.

Italian Prime Minister Mario Draghi declaredthat the face-to-face presence of the Russian president at the G20 summit is excluded. Putin’s aide Yuri Ushakov then replied that the Russian side received an invitation to the summit and responded to it. According to him, the head of state can take part in it in person.

Then former British Prime Minister Boris Johnson called not to boycott the G20 summit if Putin came to it. The head of the European Commission, Ursula von der Leyen, also opposed the boycott of the summit.

After the start of Russia’s special operation in Ukraine, a number of Western countries included in the G20 even called for Russia to be excluded from the association, but the rest of the G20 members opposed such a measure.