For months Vladimir Putin has left open whether he will travel to Bali to attend a summit of the 20 most important industrialized and developing countries. As the Kremlin finally confirmed on Thursday, it instead sent Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov to the Indonesian holiday island. With the cancellation, the Russian president avoided confrontation with visiting G7 heads of state and government, including American President Joe Biden and the Federal Chancellor. Olaf Scholz.

However, war and its consequences on global energy and food security will be at the center of negotiations there. In addition, Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy has announced that he wants to take part in the G-20 meeting, at least virtually. Since Putin doesn’t show up, focus turns to biden and Chinese leader Xi Jinping. On Thursday, the White House said the two would meet on Monday on the sidelines of the summit for their first bilateral meeting since Biden took office.

Shortly after his controversial inaugural visit to China, the German Chancellor returned to a region increasingly marred by rivalry between the United States and China. The war in Europe has raised concerns that a military conflict could also break out in the region, sparked, for example, by the invasion of Taiwan. At this location offers next door G-20 Summit On November 15 and 16, a number of other top-level meetings will provide an opportunity for the countries concerned to exchange ideas.

On Thursday, for example, the first heads of state and government arrived in the Cambodian capital Phnom Penh for the ASEAN summit, which will also meet their dialogue partners at the weekend, including the United States, China, Japan and India. After the Bali Summit, the Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation (APEC) Summit will take place on November 18-19 in Bangkok, Thailand.

However, Germany was not involved in these two events. For that, Scholz visited on his trip to Asia before visiting Indonesia Vietnamese and Singapore.

Southeast Asian countries are pleased with the attention. The war in Europe has raised concerns that United States of America and their allies could forget the territory. According to the federal government’s Indo-Pacific guidelines, the association of ASEAN countries is one of Germany’s priority partners.

Vietnam, Singapore and Indonesia are not only important business locations, but also key countries in dealing with China and – though not as prominently – with Russia. Singapore has close ties to China, but has emerged as one of the US’ closest military and political partners, without being among formal allies such as Thailand and the Philippines. The city-state is the only country in Southeast Asia to impose sanctions on Russia. Scholz will take part in the Asia-Pacific German Business Conference there with Vice Chancellor Robert Habeck on Sunday and Monday.