About two weeks ahead of the G-20 summit in New Delhi, Russian president Vladimir Putin spoke to Prime Minister Narendra Modi to convey his inability to attend the meet. He will be represented by Russia foreign minister Sergey Lavrov. This wasn’t unexpected – Putin skipped the recent BRICS meet in South Africa and the G20 summit in Bali last November. The only exception he had made was for the SCO summit in Samarkand last year.
Putin’s absence from the G20 summit was confirmed by the Kremlin last week on account of his focus on “special military operation” in Ukraine. Thus, his phone conversation with the Indian PM touched upon other issues of bilateral interest besides iterating Russia’s cooperation for the two-day summit starting on September 9. That, however, doesn’t take away from the fact that Putin would be conspicuous in his absence at the summit.
