Beginning today, South Africa will participate in a combined military drill with Russia and China that some claim amounts to a support for Russia’s invasion of Ukraine.
The 10-day naval exercises, which will go on around the anniversary of the war in Ukraine, have drawn criticism from the US as well.
However, South Africa’s government claims that it maintains its impartial stance in the conflict and that it frequently hosts such exercises with other nations, such as France and the US.
In the Indian Ocean, off the coast of South Africa, the Mosi II naval drills will be held.
There will be 350 participants, according to the South African National Defence Force.
The Admiral Gorshkov cruiser, which is equipped with Zircon hypersonic missiles, will be sent, according to a Russian announcement. These have a 1,000 km range and travel at nine times the speed of sound (620 miles).
The SANDF hasn’t disclosed much about the upcoming exercise, but a joint drill involving the three nations in 2019 comprised seven ships, including a survey ship and a fueling ship from each nation.
They practiced fighting off floods and fires along the shore as well as retaking ships from pirates.
In January, a White House representative said: “The United States has concerns about any country… exercising with Russia as Russia wages a brutal war against Ukraine.”
South Africa earlier abstained from a UN vote condemning the invasion. Additionally, it declined to impose sanctions against Russia alongside the US and Europe.
According to the executive director of the South African Institute of International Affairs, Elizabeth Sidiropoulos, South Africa is also participating due to underfunded and overstretched condition of its military forces.
Priorities for the navy include defending domestic fisheries and battling piracy in the Indian Ocean.
“It needs to team up with other nations to have the capacity to deal with things off its coast such as piracy,” she said.
The exercise this year, according to Ms. Sidiropoulos, will benefit Russia more than anyone else.
“It shows that Russia can still project its power far away, and that it still has allies around the world.
“It lets them say that it’s not the world that’s against Russia. Only the West is against Russia.”
