The G20 leaders participating in the New Delhi summit praised its success after Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi announced a joint declaration despite disagreements over the Ukraine war.
The US Principal Deputy National Security Adviser, Jon Finer, considered the declaration a "big potential step forward" regarding sovereignty and territorial integrity.
Finer explained in press statements that the declaration reflects the agreement of major economies required to uphold international law and Russia to respect international law.
Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov hailed the G20 summit, saying it was a "success for Moscow."
He said it was a sign that the global south would no longer blindly follow the Western powers.
"They don't want to be told to follow the Zelenskiy formula," Lavrov said, referring to the Ukrainian president.
Another indication of the summit's success included the meeting between US President Joe Biden and Chinese Prime Minister Li Qiang, who led his country's delegation to New Delhi.
During a press conference, Biden said: "My team, my staff still meets with President Xi's people and cabinet."
"I met with his No.2 person in India today."
He added: "We talked about stability," and the Southern Hemisphere. "It wasn't confrontational at all."
-Joint declaration
Modi told the leaders attending the summit in New Delhi that they reached a consensus on the declaration, which called on all states to abide by the principles of international law, including respecting territorial integrity and sovereignty, international humanitarian law, and the multilateral system that protects peace and stability.
The declaration emphasized that states must "refrain from the threat or use of force to seek territorial acquisition" and that "the use or threat of use of nuclear weapons is inadmissible."
The declaration called for implementing the Black Sea initiative to safely flow grain, food, and fertilizer from Ukraine and Russia.
Moscow pulled out of the agreement in July over a failure to meet its demands to implement a parallel agreement easing rules for its food and fertilizer exports.
The declaration said the group agreed to address debt vulnerabilities in low and middle-income countries "in an effective, comprehensive and systematic manner" but did not make any fresh action plan.
It said countries pledged to strengthen and reform multilateral development banks while it accepted the proposal for tighter regulation of cryptocurrencies.
Modi inaugurated the meeting by calling on members to end a "global trust deficit" and announced that the bloc was granting permanent membership to the African Union to make it more representative.
- Ukrainian disappointment
Meanwhile, Ukrainian Foreign Ministry spokesman Oleg Nikolenko took a screenshot of the relevant section of the joint declaration, with several pieces of the text crossed out in red and corrected with wording that reflects Ukraine's position.
"G20 adopted a final declaration. We are grateful to the partners who tried to include strong wording in the text. However, regarding Russia's aggression against Ukraine, the G20 has nothing to be proud of. This is how the main elements of the text could look to be closer to reality," he said.
"Ukraine is grateful to the partners who tried to include strong formulations in the text."
Furthermore, German Chancellor Olaf Scholz lauded the declaration for supporting Ukraine's territorial and sovereign integrity.
He noted that it was a success that Russia ultimately abandoned its objection to such a decision simply because all others moved in this direction.
In turn, French President Emmanuel Macron said on Sunday that the G20, founded to solve international economic issues, was not necessarily the place to expect diplomatic progress on the war in Ukraine.
However, he said the G20 declaration was not a diplomatic victory for Russia.
"This G20 confirms once again the isolation of Russia," Macron told a press conference after the summit's closing ceremony.
- 200 hours of negotiation
India's G20 Sherpa Amitabh Kant said it took over 200 hours of non-stop negotiations to deliver a consensus on the G20 declaration adopted at the Leaders' Summit.
He explained that the Indian diplomats held 300 bilateral meetings and circulated 15 drafts on the contentious Ukraine conflict with their counterparts.
Kant pointed out that Brazil was among the countries that helped reach a consensus on the paragraph allocated to Ukraine within the statement.
For his part, Brazilian President Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva described the summit as "successful," noting that "we cannot let geopolitical issues sequester the G20 agenda of discussions. We have no interest in a divided G20. We need peace and cooperation instead of conflict."
Modi handed over the presidency of the G20 to Lula, affirming his "support" to Brazil, which will host the upcoming summit scheduled for November 2024 in Rio de Janeiro.
- An invitation to Putin
Lula said Putin would be invited to next year's event, adding that he planned to attend a BRICS bloc of developing nations meeting due in Russia before the Rio meeting.
He announced that the Russian leader would not be arrested in Brazil if he attended the G20 meeting next year.
In March, the International Criminal Court issued an arrest warrant against Putin, accusing him of the war crime of illegally deporting hundreds of children from Ukraine.
Russia denied its forces have engaged in war crimes or forcibly taken Ukrainian children.
