Security matters: G20 Foreign Ministers meet on Afghanistan

On September 22 2021, the Foreign Ministers of the G20 under the chairmanship of the Italian Minister for Foreign Affairs Luigi Di Maio, convened for a virtual gathering given the ongoing complications of the pandemic for in-person summitry. Sixteen ministers were present (including the US, France, Germany, the UK, China and India) as well as UN Secretary General Antonio Guterres.

While Zoom-plomacy may still be taking its odd first steps as a new normal in international relations, something else occurred at that gathering which made it stand out: the raison d’être of the summit was an exchange of ideas between G20 member nations on Afghanistan, given the recent US withdrawal, the return of the Taliban and the overall potential threat it poses for global security, which certainly concern NATO allies, but also other G20 members like Turkey, Russia, India and China, who now have to deal with a new geopolitical wildcard in their very backyards.

The Afghanistan discussion at the gathering stood out, because since its inception under Mexican auspices in 2012, the Foreign Ministers’ G20 has carefully sidestepped “hard” global security issues - leaving them in the purview of the G7 - focusing instead on less contentious issues involving broad multilateralism and cooperation, with the notable exception of the 2013 St. Petersburg summit, where Russia stepped up in an impromptu yet welcomed fashion with an emergency proposal to broker the Syrian chemical weapons stocks’ disarmament to avoid a Western-led strike, after the Assad regime crossed the Obama “red line.”

This time around, the G20 Foreign Ministers’ security matters agenda, while a bit circumstantial, appears more deliberate, and signals that we truly now are firmly footed in a multipolar new world order, for the first time in almost a century. It took root progressively in many ways, over the last decade.

In rather explicit ways, Russia and China have become eager to assert their authorities within what they see as their close spheres of influence, like in Crimea, Eastern Europe or in Hong Kong or around the South China Sea, and as the new brokers in the Middle East and Asia, all while Western countries became embattled in endless wars and nation-building efforts with limited impacts and extremely high human, financial and political costs.

In response, just recently, we have seen the new AUKUS alliance emerge on the far eastern horizon between Australia, the United Kingdom and the United States to counter Chinese influence in the Indo-Pacific.

Even middle powers are putting their chips in the game. Back in 2010, Turkey and Brazil attempted to independently broker a deal with Iran over its nuclear operations, and we are also seeing the members of the very diverse “G4” (Brazil, Germany, India and Japan) whose main common goals are permanent seats for themselves on the United Nations Security Council (UNSC), coming up with a range of initiatives on their own, on the sidelines of the G20 Foreign Ministers’ meeting.

All the aforementioned countries (except for Iran) are G20 members. And while regional and interests-based alliances are in the natural order of diplomacy and must be allowed to be, the G20’s chief diplomats must not forget that they are part of a broader framework in which the actions of one country ripple in all others, and will affect them in the end too. It is in that spirit that the G20 Foreign Ministers’ group should continue exploring a progressive adoption of a security agenda, and eventually formalize its foray in matters of war and peace.

In that very spirit, Japanese Foreign Minister Taro Kono suggested in 2018 that the G20 Foreign Ministers gathering might eventually constitute a good venue in the future for head diplomats to smooth out global security issues.

He is not alone in thinking so. Just recently, China’s Foreign Minister Wang Yi declared that he was hoping the G20 Foreign Ministers’ could play a “constructive role” on Afghanistan. For China, finding itself under increasing international pressure, it likely sees that forum as a place to discuss and spar on equal footing among peers, somewhat removed from the direct pressure of leaders, where it can advance and possibly negotiate its priorities among competing interests, as opposed to the G7 where it does not hold a seat.

Watchers, diplomats and academics may point out that a lack of traditional joint communiqué at the conclusion of the September 22 meeting means a lack of consensus, and then bring into question the relevance of the gathering. 

In response, one could argue that the fact that the Afghanistan discussion was even held between G20 members is significant. For over a decade, the repetitive G7 Foreign Ministers’ communiqués and their lofty goals have had a generally limited impact on global security matters. In Israel-Palestine, in Syria, in Crimea, in Iran, in North Korea and as it happens, in Afghanistan, facts on the ground did not change much because the G7’s chief diplomats expressed their ongoing concerns or encouragement.

While it is true that the G20 Foreign Ministers did not issue a communiqué after the virtual meeting, the group should not be demeaned for it. Significant differences on policies and interests exist on ongoing geopolitical matters. But the venue exists. The ministers met. The discussion was held. And that is not insignificant.

For nearly two years now, the COVID-19 pandemic has put the entire world in a state of shock. Fragile states, shuttered business, vulnerable people and a changing climate are severely mortgaging the physical and metaphysical world order and the institutions which support it. The potential for signalling failure and catastrophic errors, as emerging nations compete to fill the new regional power vacua, is high. 

It is therefore sensible that every venue for communication and cooperation, as imperfect or unorthodox as it may be, must be encouraged. As a venture, an arm’s length removed from its leaders in an era of managed democracy and trendy authoritarianism, a flexible G20 Foreign Ministers forum can be a force to be reckoned with, even virtually through a seemingly inane quick group call on Zoom.

As such, it holds much promise, and it is not unlike the Concert of Europe in the post-Napoleonic world which helped keep a relative peace in multipolar Europe between 1814 and 1914. A century after that fact, a G20 Foreign Ministers’ group could help steer and infuse the UNSC with political leadership, as well as the technical, cooperation organizations and agencies which work to ensure relative peace and security worldwide.

Come next year, it will be interesting to see if the next G20 host, Indonesia, at a crossroads hub in the Indo-Pacific, deems it in its interest to pursue and broaden the security discussion in the G20, as China mobilizes allies and rivals alike in its ascent and assertiveness.

Western nations may have legitimate gripes in having to deal with authoritarians or strongmen regimes. However, the fact remains that in this day and age, peace and stability in rough geopolitical neighbourhoods are not likely to be achieved in a consensus built between friends, allies and democrats half a world away, but rather between competing, rival, even enemy nations.

The new world is here. It is odd, unexpected, unforeseen and unpredictable. In attempting to find workable configurations, the G20 nations, their governments and their head diplomats must strive to make the most of it, for global peace and stability is in the interest of all.

The Uninvited Guest

As world leaders gather in St. Petersburg to discuss the fragile global economic recovery, one uninvited guest is poised to crash the party and make a whole lot of noise: the Syrian crisis. As proof of the use of chemical weapons is gathered, dead bodies continue to pile up and the threat of a regional conflagration involving Israel, Iran and Iraq rises, the Syrian civil war will be the elephant in the room at the Russian G20 Summit and might very well overtake the economy as the focal point of discussions, thereby changing the nature of the organization by osmosis.

Up to this point, global security matters have been the “jurisdiction” of the G8, not the G20. Aside from an informal meeting of the G20’s Foreign Ministers in Mexico in February 2012, the organization has refrained from expanding its mandate. But the ongoing war in Syria, the East versus West deadlock over rogue states and the threat they pose as well the economic disruptions coming from the Middle East make it now painfully obvious that the world’s great powers, some of which have been playing the Cold War game in the past three years, must now come together, agree to a solution and carry it out.

Russia’s reluctance to play the new multipolar game and its bad habit of falling back to Soviet-style foreign policy of Western fear-mongering, UN vetoes and arming rogue regimes has been ridiculously puzzling. In fact, if there was a country which could have made a strong and swift difference and increased its standing through a proactive role, it would have been Russia.

Obama’s scheduled one-on-one meeting with the new Chinese leader Xi Jinping will certainly aim at finding common ground with China for them to at least abstain vetoing a UN Security Council resolution, and its secondary aim is certainly to make Vladimir Putin isolated – the Snowden affair being a convenient excuse to avoid a larger discussion on foreign policy.

In the past 24 hours however, Putin has changed his tune to something more reasonable and pragmatic, echoing the United Nations’ Ban Ki Moon, shifting from drastically opposing any action on Syria to possibly endorsing a strike at the Security Council if the proof is made public and actually adds up – which is balanced position, all things considered. The pressures from the diplomatic back channels must have been intense.

Hosting the G20 is a moment for prestige for a country, a moment to shine. But for Vladimir Putin, it is his last window of opportunity for a certain time as a global statesman, to build bridges and play a constructive game and get Russia to step out of the shadow of the USSR, embrace multilateralism and play a meaningful role in the global community.

Stay tuned and watch how the US, Russian and Chinese discourses on Syria change in the coming days - it might just herald the changing nature of the G20.

*** 15:30 EDT UPDATE ***

I have just received this Google Alert out of Reuters:

G20 foreign ministers to attend Russia summit to discuss Syria
Source: Reuters - Tue, 3 Sep 2013 02:59 PM

PARIS, Sept 3 (Reuters) - Foreign ministers from key G20 member states will convene on the sidelines of this week's meeting in St Petersburg to discuss Syria, France said on Tuesday.

"(French) Foreign Minister Laurent Fabius will travel on Sept. 5 and 6 to meet foreign ministers present at the G20 summit, notably those of the United States, Brazil, China, Russia and Turkey," Foreign Ministry spokesman Philippe Lalliot told reporters.

A French diplomatic source said the ministers, who do not usually attend G20 summits, would meet to specifically talk about the Syria crisis and discuss political perspectives. (Reporting By John Irish, editing by Mike Peacock).

Source: http://www.trust.org/item/20130903145324-c5h6c

The Great Game

The hot-zones today. How many G20 countries can you count in their vicinity?

The current state of relations between the American and Russian governments will no doubt remind some of the Cold War. Sharp tongues, covert operations, proxy wars, threats of using force – it’s all there, albeit, in a much less intense fashion. It is also a complete waste of time.

Last June, when it hosted the G20 summit in Los Cabos, the Mexican government did not convene a follow-up meeting of the G20 Foreign Ministers, even though it had been tentatively put forward after their first informal gathering last February. It is unfortunate because it could have been used to discuss frankly, openly and face to face the current challenges to international security that are posed by North Korea, Iran and most recently, Syria.

While hoping for some kind of major agreement on upcoming steps in all three scenarios might have been far-fetched, the world could have used some sense of unity in the broadest sense from the G20 nations’ chief diplomats. Instead, we are privy to yet another “Great Game” between the US-Russia and China troika, played out in diplomatic circles, through covert operations, weapons shipments and UN Security Council vetoes, while our world becomes increasingly dangerous.

Syria is the last remaining “active” fire of the Arab Spring and is quickly catching up to Libya in terms of bloodbath. However, because of the country’s strategic location – at the very heart of the least stable region of the globe – the conflict has been at the very centre of a tug o’ war between the US and Western nations and the Russia/China strategic alliance.

Certainly, Bashar Al-Assad bears most of the blame for the extreme escalation of the conflict. But Russia and China, fearing a repeat of the “over-interpretation” of UNSC resolution 1970 on Libya have consistently vetoed any bold proposal against Syria. Russians went as far as attempting to deliver Mi25 attack helicopters and missiles to Al-Assad’s regime earlier this summer, and are likely politically flexing their muscles by deploying amphibious assault ships and hundreds of marines in their naval base at Tartus shortly.

On the other hand, news broke this past week that the US President Barack Obama authorized clandestine support to the rebels by the CIA through humanitarian, logistical, communications and financial help which likely explains the growing progress they have made in the recent weeks. Official sources claim no arms are being sent by the US; this may or may not be true. And of course, financial help begs the question: what is stopping the recipients of US funds from acquiring weapons with that money? What is truly worrying about the Syrian rebels is the growing legions of foreign fighters affiliated to Al-Qaeda joining their side. In the advent of a rebel victory, what will happen to them? Could US help be in fact diverted to help a new generation of Al-Qaeda terrorists?

While East and West throw an encore of the Cold War, Iran coldly calculates its next move with its nuclear program, sending its Basij and financing Hezbollah to support the fledging Al-Assad. When Damascus finally falls, no real distraction will remain in the Middle East, and all eyes will look to Teheran. What some call the “Syrian Uprising” is but a prelude to the next chapter: a confrontation with Iran.

Welcome!

Welcome to the G20 Foreign Ministers Monitor! This is the Internet’s first blog dedicated solely to the newly created branch of the Group of 20 chief diplomats. It will provide analysis, commentary, criticism and projections about the meetings and actions of the G20 Foreign Ministers.

A bit about me

My name is Alexandre T. Gingras and I will be writing on here in the coming months and hopefully years. I reside near Ottawa, Canada, and hold a Bachelors’ Degree in Political Science from the University of Ottawa and a Master’s Degree from the University of Uppsala in Sweden.

Discussing with Dr. Mohamed ElBaradei in Mauritius

My Master’s thesis entitled Pre-Emptive Peace: Collective Security and Rogue States in the 21^st Century, written and published in 2010, advocated and articulated the need to expand the G20’s responsibilities in the fold of international security through the creation of a Foreign Ministers group, in order to assist the United Nations Security Council (UNSC) in the disarmament talks over nuclear proliferation situations in Iran and North Korea. It was the first extensive discussion on the creation of a G20 Foreign Ministers group, which had been mentioned in passing previously by Professor John Kirton and former Finnish politician Risto Penttilä, and it has received the support of many academics, politicians, and diplomats, including former IAEA Director and Nobel Peace Prize laureate Mohamed ElBaradei.

A brief history

With former Canadian Prime Minister Paul Martin in Cameroon

Let’s quickly recap the G20’s history. Former Canadian Finance Minister Paul Martin created and presided over the G20 Finance Ministers group, which initially met in Berlin in 1999, in the wake of the Asian financial crisis. When Martin became Prime Minister of Canada, he advocated expanding the G20 to also include the leaders of the nations represented: presidents, prime ministers and kings. However there was resistance from George W. Bush over the Martin plan between 2003 and 2006. Ultimately, because of the global economic crisis of 2008, Bush called for the first G20 leaders’ summit in 2008, which is largely credited with saving the world from an economic disaster of apocalyptic proportions.

A growing role

While its initial leaders’ meetings in Washington, London, Pittsburgh and Toronto initially focused on the global economic security and recovery, in November 2010 at the Seoul Summit, the G20 took on the issue of international development, which had been until then a G8 responsibility.

I proposed that this was the first of many responsibilities that would eventually shift to the G20. Indeed, between 2010 and 2011, the G20 Ministers of International Development, Labour, Energy and Agriculture held their first meetings, and I urged officials in Canada, the United States, the United Kingdom, France, Russia and Korea as well as policy experts in think-tanks advising G20 host nations to push for the same. On February 19 and 20, 2012, the G20 Foreign Ministers met for the first time in Los Cabos, Mexico, for an informal gathering.

The first-ever G20 Foreign Ministers meeting in February 2012

So the story begins…

In my opinion, the biggest shift in international relations in decades just took place in Mexico. That is what this blog will be about. While people might not realize it overnight, the discussions and eventual “alignment” of 20 most powerful countries’ foreign policies and their chief diplomats is likely to change the very nature of peace and conflict as we know them, in building a safer and more secure world.