The leaders of the G20 countries will not take a joint photo at the summit in Bali due to the presence of Russia: the participants do not want to pose next to Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov, who will represent the country. The Guardian writes about it.
The publication claims that the picture will be refused to be taken due to "general discomfort" in connection with the presence of Russia. World leaders are traditionally photographed together at the beginning of the summit, chatting and greeting each other in public.
Also, Britain and the EU were going to boycott Lavrov's speeches and seek the isolation of Russia, according to The Daily Telegraph.
This is not the first time that representatives of countries have refused to be photographed with the Russian minister. On July 8, the G20 foreign ministers refused to take a group photo in Bali due to Lavrov's presence. Reuters claims that when Lavrov was photographed with the Indonesian Foreign Minister, shouts of "When will you stop the war ?!" and “Why don’t you stop the war?!”
In November, presidential spokesman Dmitry Peskov confirmed that Vladimir Putin would not go to the summit, the country would be represented by Lavrov. Before that, Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky said that he would not take part in G20 events if Putin was there.
The G20 summit will be held on November 15–16 in Bali, and both Putin and Zelensky were initially invited to it. Political scientist, former Deputy Foreign Minister of Russia Georgy Kunadze, in a conversation with The Insider, recalled that at the G20 summit in 2014, no one wanted to communicate with Putin and did not even sit down with him at the same table for lunch. The Russian leader "sat alone, playing with his jaws" and went home without waiting for the end of official events, Kunadze said. This year, the same thing would have awaited him, the political scientist noted.