Several explosions rocked Kyiv yesterday and air raid sirens echoed across the city as a peacekeeping mission headed by seven African leaders and led by South African President Cyril Ramaphosa arrived. The delegation, including leaders from Senegal, the Comoros and Egypt, met with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky and today plans to do the same with Russian President Vladimir Putin in St. Petersburg.
Ukraine’s air defense said it shot down 12 missiles, including six Kinzhal and six Kalibr cruise missiles. At least three people were injured and dozens of private houses and other buildings were damaged by the debris, the Ukrainian Interior Ministry said.
A Reuters television crew saw the African leaders arrive in Kyiv in a convoy of vehicles and enter a hotel to go to their air raid shelter. After the danger, the African delegation paid tribute to the victims of the Russian occupation in the city of Butxa, near Kyiv.
“The Heads of State and Government visit the mass grave located behind the Orthodox Church of Sant Andreu where 458 civilians who died during the initial phase of the conflict were buried,” the South African president wrote on Twitter. Unlike all other international leaders who have visited the site, Ramaphosa avoided discussing the responsibility of Russian forces in the aforementioned deaths.
The African peace mission, which includes South African President Cyril Ramaphosa and Senegalese President Macky Sall, could propose a series of “confidence-building measures” during its initial mediation efforts, according to a draft framework document accessed by Reuters.
The document states that the objective of the mission is to “promote the importance of peace and encourage the parties to accept a negotiation process led by diplomacy”. These measures could include the withdrawal of Russian troops, the withdrawal of tactical nuclear weapons from Belarus, suspending the execution of the International Criminal Court’s arrest warrant against Putin and relaxing sanctions. This could be followed by a cessation of hostilities agreement that should be accompanied by negotiations between Russia and the West, the document says.
South Africa, a country that is part of the International Criminal Court, is the host of the next BRICS summit (an alliance formed by Brazil, Russia, India, China and South Africa) scheduled for next August and to which Vladimir Putin is invited. As a member of the ICC, South Africa would be obliged to detain the Russian president should he set foot in their country. As of now, Moscow has not confirmed whether Putin will attend the meeting and Pretoria has not wanted to clarify what it would do in the event that the leader showed up.
On Wednesday, the Kremlin noted that it is not yet clear “how the South African side plans to implement the illegal decision of the International Criminal Court, in the face of the summit.
Although in February it participated with Russia and China in joint naval maneuvers, South Africa has ensured since the beginning of the war that it is neutral in this conflict.
The mission comes after the start of a Ukrainian counter-offensive that has pushed back Russian forces in some areas. Kyiv says its own peace initiative, which calls for the withdrawal of Russian troops from all Ukrainian territories, must be the basis of any solution to the war.
