JOHANNESBURG — G20 South Africa shrugged off a U.S. boycott as leaders forged a historic summit declaration on climate change, debt relief, and global conflicts at the first-ever Group of 20 meeting hosted on African soil. The text was forced through by South Africa, with support from European and Global South allies, after Washington refused to participate in the negotiations, Saturday, Nov. 22, 2025.
Envoys at the Johannesburg summit concluded the wording without U.S. representation after more than 100 negotiations, then rushed to agree on it in an open plenary at the G20 South Africa, a lavish G20 gathering last week, according to a detailed Reuters account of the summit. The declaration reflects the severity of climate change, supports ambitious renewable energy targets, and acknowledges the increasing debt-service burdens squeezing poorer economies.
It also, according to South African officials, commits G20 members to strive toward “comprehensive and lasting peace” in conflicts from Sudan and the Democratic Republic of Congo to the occupied Palestinian territory and Ukraine, while supporting overhauls of global lenders so that vulnerable states can invest in green, resilient development.
U.S. President Donald Trump directed his delegation to snub Johannesburg, repeating unproven allegations that the Black-majority government of South Africa is forcing white farmers off their land and bashing the host over a solidarity-themed agenda. There were also stepped-up words from White House aides, who accused President Cyril Ramaphosa of “running his mouth” after he called on Washington to walk back the boycott.
Mindful that the world’s largest economy was absent from proceedings, G20 South Africa broke with tradition and had the declaration signed off at the beginning of talks, rather than waiting for substantive discussions to take place earlier in the summit. The text was adopted by unanimous consent, except for the United States, according to South African spokesman Vincent Magwenya.
But while the declaration was being hammered out, European leaders who descended on Johannesburg turned G20 South Africa into a last-minute forum for urgent discussions about Washington’s separate peace blueprint for Ukraine. An Associated Press roundup carried by Arab News reported that EU chiefs and other leaders intended to hold sideline meetings in South Africa to discuss alternatives to the U.S. plan and to show support for Kyiv.
The 28-point plan, which is U.S. backed, according to a Reuters’ analysis of it, would require Ukraine to give up the entirety of Donbas and accept what will be left of its own military after they lop off large chunks of their allowed forces; agree to Russian control over Crimea as well as large parts of eastern Ukraine; and square in the face that NATO expansion on the continent will be permanently frozen now that are no means by which either country has a hope in hell for admission whatsoever. In return, it provides limited, vaguely defined security guarantees and graduated sanctions relief to Moscow.
“The plan makes us choose between our own dignity and our interest,” Zelenskiy said Wednesday, according to the state-run Ukrinform news agency. He promised to defend Ukrainians’ freedom and to work with Washington “honestly,” even as Trump publicly urged him to agree to the deal within days.
European officials have been blunter. Peace “cannot be capitulation, French Foreign Minister Jean-Yves Le Drian said, and EU foreign policy chief Kaja Kallas said rewarding Russia with territory taken by force would be “a very dangerous moment for all.” Britain, France, and Germany are now helping Ukraine draft a counterproposal, diplomats say.
Britain’s Keir Starmer and top EU officials have spun their attendance: G20 South Africa will send a message that Europe won’t turn its back on Ukraine as the continent negotiates with Trump. They say their security, energy supplies , and political credibility are on the line if the continent seems to sign off on a settlement dominated by Washington and Moscow.
Today’s tensions over Ukraine also echo years of stormy G20 diplomacy. The 2022 Bali summit ended with a communique that, as a widely cited Reuters summary of the meeting suggested, condemned Russia’s aggression “in the strongest terms” while recognizing divisions over sanctions. By comparison, a later Reuters summary of the 2023 New Delhi summit uses slightly softer language, omitting any mention of Russia but including an assertion by states, in terms similar to those of Helsinki, that they cannot build empires by force.
The 2024 Brazilian presidency was the next step in that evolution. An Associated Press summary of the Rio summit said leaders approved a sweeping declaration about hunger, inequality, and global conflicts that addressed suffering in Ukraine but again did not directly point fingers at Russia. An influential Indian Express column on the “Global South arc” asserts that India, Brazil, and now South Africa have shifted G20 priorities towards development, climate finance, and debt relief.
South Africa had signalled those priorities well before taking up the chair. In 2024, Ramaphosa explained in a briefing to leaders that his G20 presidency would focus on inclusive growth, food security, and responsible use of artificial intelligence, pledging that “no one left behind” and African as well as wider Global South concerns would be pushed towards the top of the agenda, according to a Reuters preview of the presidency.
With the United States due to host the G20 in 2026, the showdown at the G20 in South Africa over climate, development, and the Ukraine peace plan will determine how much of that Global South agenda remains following the handover. Johannesburg, for now, has delivered a statement without Washington, tested Europe’s resolve to support Kyiv, and underscored the changing balance of power within the world’s leading economic club.
