US Secretary of State Anthony Blinken, Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov and Chinese Foreign Minister Wang Yi are to attend the Group of 20 meeting in the Indonesian resort, which will set the stage for a summit of G- 20 at the same time. venue in November. It will mark the first time Blinken and Lavrov have been in the same room, let alone in the same city, since January. There is no indication that the two will meet separately, but even without a one-on-one with Lavrov, Blinken could find himself in some tough conversations. The State Department announced on Tuesday that Blinken would hold separate talks with Wang at a time when already highly strained US-China relations have been exacerbated by Beijing’s friendly ties with Moscow. And, unlike recent leaders’ meetings with NATO and other like-minded partners, Blinken will find himself among diplomats from countries wary of the US approach to Ukraine and worried about its impact on them. US officials say that in addition to Wang, Blinken will hold bilateral talks in Bali with counterparts from countries that have not confronted the West over the Russian incursion, notably India, which has increased its purchases of Russian oil even as the US and Europe tried to stifle this revenue stream for Moscow. In announcing that Blinken would meet with Wang in Bali, the State Department had little to say about the possibility of seeing Lavrov, who the US has been avoiding since invading Ukraine in February. The ministry said there would be no official meeting between Blinken and Lavrov, who US officials accuse of a lack of seriousness before, during and after the invasion of Ukraine. “We would like to see the Russians get serious about diplomacy,” State Department spokesman Ned Price said. “We haven’t seen it yet. We would like the Russians to give us a reason to meet bilaterally with them, with Foreign Minister Lavrov, but the only thing we have seen coming from Moscow is more brutality and aggression against the people and country of Ukraine.” The Biden administration argues that there can be no “business as usual” with Moscow while the war continues. But neither Price nor other US officials could rule out the possibility of a chance Blinken-Lavroff meeting in Bali, which would be their first since their last meeting in Geneva in January. Price declined to discuss what he called the “choreography” of the G-20. Like almost all recent international diplomatic gatherings, the Bali meeting will be overshadowed by Ukraine. But unlike the Western-dominated G-7 and NATO summits held in Europe last week, the G-20 will have a different flavor. China and many other participants, including India, South Africa and Brazil, have resisted signing on to the US and Europe’s outright opposition to Russia’s invasion. Some flatly refused Western pleas to join in condemning the conflict, which the US and its allies see as an attack on the rules-based international order that has prevailed since the end of World War II. Thus, there may be difficulty in achieving G-20 consensus on efforts to mitigate the food and energy impacts of the conflict in Ukraine, particularly with China and Russia in the room. That won’t stop the U.S. from trying, according to U.S. officials. They want to see the G-20 throw its weight behind a UN-backed initiative to release some 20 million tonnes of Ukrainian grain for export mainly to the Middle East, Africa and Asia. “We would like the G-20 to hold Russia accountable and insist on supporting this initiative,” said Ramin Tolui, assistant undersecretary of state for economic and business affairs. While several nations, including G-20 host Indonesia, are pushing for Russia to ease its Black Sea blockade to allow grain to enter the world market, they remain wary of competition from Moscow and its friends in Beijing. And that divergence set the stage for a potentially contentious preparatory meeting ahead of the G-20 summit in November, amid questions about whether Russian President Vladimir Putin will attend. The US has made clear it does not believe Putin should attend, but has urged Indonesia to invite Ukrainian President Volodymr Zelenskyy if the Russian leader attends. Meanwhile, the U.S. and China are separately at odds over many issues ranging from trade and human rights to Taiwan and disputes in the South China Sea. Blinken’s meeting with Wang was announced after China’s trade envoy to Washington expressed concern about US tariffs on Chinese imports in a conversation with US Treasury Secretary Janet Yellen. Neither side has given any indication that progress has been made on the issue, and US officials have played down the chances of any progress in the near term. In his meeting with Wang, US officials said Blinken would instead push to keep lines of communication open and create “guardrails” to guide the world’s two largest economies as they navigate increasingly complex and potentially explosive issues. “It is absolutely critical that we have open lines of communication with our Chinese counterparts, particularly at the senior level … to ensure that we prevent any miscalculation that could inadvertently lead to conflict and confrontation,” said Daniel Kritenbrink, the top diplomat for the USA for Asia. From Bali, Blinken will travel to Bangkok, Thailand, to make up for a trip to the Thai capital he was forced to cancel late last year due to COVID-19. In addition to Thai officials, Blinken will meet with refugees who have fled the ongoing political violence and repression in Myanmar since the coup that toppled a civilian government in February 2021.
