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The President of South Africa H.E Cyril Ramaphosa will on Thursday, 24 April 2025, host the President of the war stricken country Ukraine, H.E Volodymr Zelenskyy at the Union Buildings in Pretoria.
According to the Presidency, Zelenskyy will be in the country on an official visit; the meeting is aimed at establishing and strengthening bilateral relations between the two countries.
The Presidency says the Official Visit to South Africa by President Zelenskyy will be the first by a Head of State from Ukraine, and follows on the visit to Ukraine by President Ramaphosa, as part of the Africa Peace Initiative to Ukraine on 16 June 2023.
The visit provides South Africa and Ukraine with an opportunity to discuss bilateral relations and expand bilateral cooperation in the areas of Trade, Agriculture and Education. It will also explore areas of cooperation with the objective to support efforts to bring lasting peace.
South Africa is taking a none-alliance stance in this meeting and is expected to discuss the conflict between Russia and Ukraine and possible ways of finding peaceful resolutions. It is also expected that Zelenskyy will ask South Africa to play an intercessory role in negotiating with Russia to release the 19 000 children who are allegedly abducted since the war broke out.
Russia is an ally of South Africa via the BRICS bloc, and the two countries have a sacred relationship dating back during the Soviet Union, a then world super power, and during the apartheid era in South Africa.
Since America has thrown the globe into much economic uncertainty through its trade wars and imposing retaliation tariffs on its trade partners, and following the fallout between Ukraine and USA, both countries would like to extend their global trade footprint and find alternative trade partners across the globe.
It will be interesting to see the kind of influence South Africa will have on the conflict between Russia and Ukraine and if it can bring the war to an end.
