A period of discord: how the friendship of peoples was built in Ugra
This week Khanty-Mansiysk hosted the International Public Diplomacy Forum "Everyone's Responsibility for a Common Future". Twenty-eight states plus Russia took part. The Assembly of Peoples of Eurasia and Africa posed to representatives of different countries the question of building a common future without looking solely at the geopolitical situation in the world: that bridges between states should be built not by diplomats, but by civil institutions and ordinary people. However, discussions on the margins of the forum often followed the principle of si vis pacem, para bellum - it was impossible to ignore the differences between states. Read more about the search for universal peace in Yugra in Izvestia.
When official diplomacy does not work
Representatives of European, Asian and African countries gathered at the forum in the Khanty-Mansiysk Autonomous Okrug, not afraid of possible November frosts in Khanty-Mansiysk. All the more so, the weather was imbued with the ideas of public diplomacy and made a compromise: out of respect for the guests, it changed 25-degree frosts the day before the event to mild 0 ... +1 degree.
Public diplomacy is underestimated - this was the leitmotif of the welcoming speeches delivered at the plenary session of the forum. Konstantin Kosachev, Deputy Chairman of the Federation Council, emphasized in his welcoming speech that every person has the opportunity to influence the life of the region, country and continent.
- Public diplomacy has two important missions. The first is to build bridges where official diplomacy sometimes fails. When politicians try to isolate or build barriers, society continues the dialog, and this is extremely important," the senator said. - The second task is to broadcast the real picture of each other, as politicians and the media often distort it to suit the current conjuncture.
Secretary General of the Assembly of Peoples of Eurasia and Africa Andrei Belianinov said the same thing: politicians have stopped trusting each other, and international norms and law have been destroyed. But nations do not need military conflicts in which "thousands and hundreds of thousands of people" die.
- What we used to perceive with a smile - public diplomacy - is becoming a real force that can influence political events," he said.
Hopes against the backdrop of contradictions
Words about the rapprochement of peoples at the forum were surprisingly intertwined with statements about walls.
- We live in a period of not only global uncertainty, but also growing hopes against the backdrop of rapid changes in the world, contradictions between powerful countries and tectonic shifts on the world stage," said Rashid Alimov, member of the Supreme Advisory Council of the Assembly of Peoples of Eurasia and Africa, former SCO Secretary General. - There is a transformation of the world system and the formation of a multipolar world. At the same time, the world, despite the acuteness of contradictions, remains holistic and interconnected: there is a rethinking of what is happening; ties that were broken as a result of conflicts are being re-established, and some are becoming even stronger.
Rashid Alimov
He expressed confidence that in most countries of the world, public opinion is in favor of "self-determination of national development and security, with the exception of dictatorial political regimes".
- And those who think that the world is once again raising barrier walls and lowering iron curtains are mistaken. Of course, there are such attempts. But they are doomed to failure," Rashid Alimov emphasized. - On the contrary, cardinal changes in the world landscape, which are taking place nowadays, open the world space even wider, creating new favorable conditions for the creation of a renewed world order.
Dmitry Birichevsky, Director of the Department of Economic Cooperation of the Russian Foreign Ministry, paid tribute to Rashid Alimov's eastern wisdom, but immediately characterized the current situation as "an irreconcilable struggle for the formation of a new world order".
- The U.S. claims its exclusivity, but now the world majority states are Russia, China, India, Malaysia, Iran," the Foreign Ministry spokesman said. - And other countries of the Global South and East are already increasing their political and economic weight.
He said that the "Washington-style model of economic relations" with its "sanctions voluntarism" is nearing its end, but so far the existing system generates significant risks for the whole world and only exacerbates imbalances in the global economy. Against this background, "efforts to build cooperation on an equal footing are needed more than ever, which is why the role of alliances is growing": EAEU, SCO, ASEAN, CSTO and CIS, as well as public diplomacy.
According to Birichevsky, the dialog between many countries officially does not exist or is minimal, but at the same time domestic business "is still working productively with all foreign partners, because there are still reasonable forces in the West that do not want to lose the Russian market".
- The unity and cohesion of the world majority, observed in various parts of the world, has not left our continent, Eurasia, where more and more countries realize their identity and intend to achieve success in economy, culture and humanitarian sphere on this basis, - said the representative of the Foreign Ministry. - Forming the Greater Eurasia, we keep the doors open for absolutely everyone who is constructively inclined, who is interested, who expresses readiness for cooperation in a wide range of sectoral areas.
He called public diplomacy the framework of the Greater Eurasian Partnership, which is the name of President Vladimir Putin's initiative put forward in his address to the Federal Assembly back in 2015. The Foreign Ministry believes in building this partnership even now.
About war and peace
What "people's diplomacy" really is, by the middle of the forum, was not quite clear. One way or another, everyone was talking about things that are hardly "people's diplomacy" in the ordinary sense: political and economic alliances, and even more about disagreements with the West. At one of the sessions, the topic was "media diplomacy," but the conversation about the possibility of building an information world began when Grigory Pruttskov, a professor at the Creative Industries Department of the Media Institute of the National Research University Higher School of Economics, stated that so far there has been an information war.
- As long as information wars accompany military actions, in my opinion, the information world is unattainable," he said.
The whole discussion at the forum sounded as if the Latin expression si vis pacem, para bellum ("if you want peace, prepare for war") is the only recipe even for public diplomacy.
- It seems to me that this is a normal situation, because in the current situation we must inevitably operate with such categories," Pruttskov told Izvestia. - Even if we set ourselves such a goal, we will not be able to avoid the issue of war when talking about peace. Maybe it is precisely on this opposition that the truth is born.
He recalled the 70s of the twentieth century, when people who had gone through the Second World War signed many documents that served to defuse international relations. Another thing is that international détente in the second half of the twentieth century could not have happened only thanks to public diplomacy: the same teleconferences between the USSR and the USA could not have taken place without the approval of the authorities, Grigory Prutskov said.
- So far we are living in a moment when the European Peace Foundation is financing war, when the very word "peace" has somehow become equivalent to the word "war". This is a monstrous situation, and our task is to get away from these paradigms," he summarized.
Andrei Belianinov told the Izvestia correspondent how last year they tried to talk about building public diplomacy on the margins of one of the assembly events in Belgorod.
Secretary General of the Assembly of Peoples of Eurasia and Africa Andrei Belianinov
- Delegations from Arab countries came, almost 140 people from different states. At that time, the Israeli-Palestinian conflict had just begun. I feared that there would be a lot of politics..... And so it turned out to be! But they just can't keep quiet! - he said.
However, the meetings themselves are already good. Andrei Belianinov told how five ambassadors from African countries - Kenya, Ethiopia, Djibouti, South Sudan, North Sudan - recently came to the Moscow office of the Assembly.
- They all sat in the same row, the ambassadors of Sudan and South Sudan next to each other, although the countries are not on the best of terms with each other. But they come to us because this is apparently a very successful form of cooperation.
In turn, Ruben Safrastyan, a member of the General Council of the Assembly of Peoples of Eurasia and Africa, Advisor to the Director of the Institute of Oriental Studies of the National Academy of Sciences of Armenia, said at one of the sessions of the forum that in the South Caucasus, a small but very complex region, there has recently been a tendency to find mutually acceptable solutions to conflict situations and, moreover, a tendency to the establishment of future conflict-free region.
What is people's diplomacy
According to Andrei Bellyaninov, public diplomacy is based on three pillars: education, culture and sports, but recently projects in the field of economy have been appearing more and more often. The main thing that this format gives us is respect for each other.
- When people who want to work in this format of public diplomacy come to us, some expect us to give them instructions, some methods. No, we do not know your country better than you do. Say what you think you need to say, but without "headiness". This is what attracts us to each other," said the Secretary General of the Assembly.
World Nomad Games in Astana
So far, the world is living more in the era of global mistrust, experts at the forum said. But there are good examples.
At the forum, Nursultan Adenov, director of the SCO and Silk Road Cultural Integration Centre in the Kyrgyz Republic, spoke about the experience of the V World Nomad Games in Astana, which were attended by representatives of 89 countries. During the preparation process, the organizers were approached by the European Union's representative for Central Asia with a request to ban the participation of athletes from Russia and Belarus. However, the organizers refused to discuss such issues, stressing that they do not pursue political goals, but create a platform for rapprochement and dialogue of cultures. Threats that in this case EU countries would not participate in the Games had no effect: the result was the opposite - 13 European countries came to the Games.
- This is a vivid example of how people and politicians can disagree dramatically. Thepeople want rapprochement and friendship despite the policies of their leaders," said Nursultan Adenov.
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