While South Africa’s presidency has denied a U.S. ambassador’s claims that Pretoria transferred weapons to Russia last year, South Africa has not taken great pains to shore up the perception that it is “non-aligned.” The Associated Press reports:
Russia’s top army general and his South African counterpart discussed “military cooperation” while meeting Monday in Moscow, the Russian Defense Ministry said.
The announcement came hours after South African President Cyril Ramaphosa denied accusations by the United States that his country was siding with Russia in the war in Ukraine and had sent weapons to help it.
Gen. Oleg Salyukov, the commander of Russia’s ground forces, met the chief of South Africa’s army, Lt. Gen. Lawrence Mbatha, at Russia’s general command headquarters in Moscow, the Russian ministry said.
“The sides discussed issues of military cooperation and the implementation of projects geared to enhance the combat readiness of the two countries’ armies,” the ministry said in a statement. “The meeting between the military commanders yielded agreements on the further expansion of cooperation between the land forces in various areas.”
Meanwhile, Ramaphosa’s government has trashed the American ambassador, Reuben Brigety, with officials variously slamming him as egregiously incorrect, while also not clearly denying his claims that weapons were transferred to a Russian ship docked at a base near Johannesburg. On Friday, South Africa’s ministry of international relations criticized Brigety online after he met with Minister Naledi Pandor and said online that he had corrected “any misimpressions left by my public remarks” about the weapons shipment.
The ministry’s public-affairs head, Clayson Monyela, took to Twitter to characterize Brigety’s statement as a no-holds-barred apology and walkback of his initial claim about the weapons transfer — even though Brigety’s statement seemd to be neither of those things.
For its part, the State Department, as I wrote on Friday, has declined to issue any public comments to defend Brigety’s reputation from the Ramaphosa government’s attacks.
The State Department’s first comment on the matter came on Monday, when deputy Vedant Patel said “our relationship with South Africa remains strong” and that the U.S. is committed to advancing the bilateral relationship in a number of areas.