Museveni in Russia for summit

President Museveni is currently in the Russian city of St Petersburg to participate in the second Russia-Africa summit.  During the summit, he met with a committee from the African peace initiative that had previously held talks with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy and Russian President Vladimir Putin in an effort to mediate and resolve the crisis in Ukraine. 

Although President Museveni was one of the African leaders, who was nominated to be part of the African peace initiative on Ukraine, he was unable to travel for the peace mission due to health complications and was represented by his Special Envoy and former Prime Minister, Dr Ruhakana Rugunda.

The committee, which includes the Presidents of South Africa, Senegal, Zambia, Comoros Islands and other senior officials from African governments last month met President Putin and President Zelenskyy separately in their respective countries to push for an end to the conflict in Ukraine.

During the meeting, President Museveni was briefed on the progress made by the committee in the quest for peace in Ukraine. 
President Museveni reiterated his commitment to continue working with the committee to ensure a peaceful and amicable solution in Ukraine.
Earlier, President Museveni attended the opening of the 2nd Russia-Africa economic and humanitarian forum.

In his address, while opening the summit, President Putin reiterated Russia’s commitment to enhance trade, economic gains and humanitarian cooperation with Africa and expressed hope that the summit would contribute to the realisation of these goals.
President Putin assured African leaders that Russia would avert the looming food crisis caused by the conflict in Ukraine.
“Our country will continue to support needy states and regions, in partnership with its humanitarian deliveries. We seek to actively participate in building fairer systems of distribution of resources as we take maximum effort to avert the global food crisis,” he said.

He further assured the summit that Russia was ready to replace Ukraine grains both on commercial basis or as a grant and to the neediest African countries as it has expanded and recorded the highest yield ever.
He equally pledged cooperation with the African continent in the area of education through increased enrolment of African students into Russian universities, opening of Russian state media bureaus on the African continent and putting up a common information space Centre for Russia and Africa.

He also pledged cooperation science and technology and agriculture to ensure food security for the continent.