Ramaphosa confirms meeting with Russian President Vladimir Putin

Cape Town – President Cyril Ramaphosa’s office has confirmed that he had a telephone conversation with Russian President Vladimir Putin, where he briefed his BRICS counterpart on the upcoming African Leaders Peace Mission to Ukraine and Russia.

This comes while the South African government was yet to confirm what it would do following the International Criminal Court’s (ICC) warrant of arrest for Putin as South Africa was expected to host the 15th BRICS Summit from August 22 to 24 this year.

In a statement on Thursday, the presidency said the two leaders discussed the Russia-Africa Summit that was scheduled to take place at the end of July in St. Petersburg, in the Russian Federation.

“President Putin has welcomed the initiative by African Heads of State and expressed his desire to receive the peace mission.

“The telephone conversation with President Putin followed a discussion which took place on Monday, 5 June 2023 amongst the African leaders.

“The leaders discussed their forthcoming engagements with Presidents Putin and Zelensky regarding exploring ways of bringing an end to the conflict,” the presidency said.

Ramaphosa also met with fellow African leaders regarding the peace mission, with Ramaphosa saying they agreed that foreign ministers from the six African countries had to craft a roadmap for the peace plan.

He said Putin and Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky were both willing to meet him and the presidents of Senegal, Egypt, Uganda, Congo-Brazzaville and Zambia.

Cape Times