The Government of Switzerland, host this weekend of the Ukraine Peace Summithopes that this meeting of world leaders “will serve to build trust and the first steps towards a path to peace”, although he acknowledged that it will not be an easy task.
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“We will try to launch a peace process, something not easy but necessary after two years of war and thousands of dead,” highlighted in a message prior to the summit the Swiss Foreign Minister, Ignazio Cassis, who is already in the luxury hotel complex of Bürgenstock where the summit will take place.
Swiss President Viola Amherd and her Ukrainian counterpart Volodymyr Zelensky, co-organizers of this meeting in which 92 governments at different levels participate, also arrived at the summit site on Friday by helicopter, and will receive others this Saturday. 55 heads of Government and State.
As the Swiss president indicated in the same message, having managed to attract such a high number of leaders is a sign of the international community’s commitment to peace in Ukraine.
Ukraine has lost 31,000 soldiers since the start of the war and several of those on the front lines are over 40 years old.
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Most of the European countries allied with Ukraine and numerous Latin Americans They are represented by their heads of State or Government, including France, Spain, Italy, Germany, the United Kingdom or Poland, although on the American side the delegation is led by Vice President Kamala Harris.
The big absentees are Russia, which was not invited, according to Switzerland, for showing a lack of interest in participating, and China, which chose not to be in Switzerland due to the Russian absence.
Other emerging countries such as Brazil, India or South Africa have also decided to bring low-level delegations, as well as countries close to Russia such as Turkey or Hungary.
Before the start of the summit, around 4:30 p.m. local time (2:30 p.m. GMT), Amherd and Zelensky will have a bilateral meeting and will give a message to the press.
According to the Swiss hosts, the goal of the summit is “to develop a common understanding on three issues that can build trust: nuclear security, food security (and the freedom of navigation in the Black Sea necessary for this) and the humanitarian question”, with possible debates on the situation of prisoners of war and those forcibly deported.
It is expected that at the end of the summit on Sunday, an official statement will be reached that can serve, according to the hosts, as a first step towards future steps in which Russia may be involved, although it is intended to include in the text that Moscow It is the aggressor power.
On the eve of the leaders’ meeting, Russian President Vladimir Putin assured that his country would end the war only if Ukraine agreed not to join NATO and handed over its four provinces claimed by Moscow. demands that kyiv considered “absurd.”
EFE
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