"We are here to communicate a very clear message that we would like this war to be ended." That was South African President Cyril Ramaphosa's message to Vladimir Putin in St. Petersburg, the same message he had brought to Ukraine just 24 hours earlier.

Listening to both sides would be crucial for the delegation, Ramaphosa stressed. But what they heard from their hosts, at least in public, offered little cause for optimism.

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy made it clear that negotiations with Russia would only be possible once Russian forces had left Ukrainian territory.

He questioned the premise of their mission, asking out loud why his guests were even traveling to St. Petersburg after Russian missile strikes had targeted Kyiv the day of their visit. "How logical is that? I don't really understand," Zelenskyy said.

Vladimir Putin insisted Ukraine's leaders were not to be trusted. He showed his guests a previously unseen draft peace agreement drawn up in the early months of the war, which Ukraine had later rejected.

Russia, he said, was open to dialogue but Kyiv could not be relied on to keep its word. "Where are the guarantees that they won't give up any other agreements?" Putin asked.

Not only that, but Moscow has repeatedly said that any potential deal would have to recognize the "new realities,” meaning its control of almost a fifth of Ukraine's sovereign territory.

No road map for peace

There was precious little common ground to even begin preparing talks, let alone for the kinds of confidence-building measures that had been talked up in the run-up to their arrival.

South Africa's president defined ten points ranging from respect for the UN charter to the repatriation of Ukrainian children and freedom of export for food and fertilizers. These were guiding principles and aspirations rather than anything resembling a peace plan.

The timing of this mission, just as Ukraine's long-awaited counter-offensive gets underway, had raised questions from the start. Neither Ukraine nor Russia are facing the kind of collapse on the battlefield that would force them to the negotiating table.

The visits made clear that Kyiv and Moscow are still very much looking for allies, rather than mediators.

Irrespective of any concrete results, hosting this large African delegation in St. Petersburg provided some very welcome images for Vladimir Putin, who needs to show ordinary Russians that the West's efforts to isolate Russia have failed.

All the more so since the ICC arrest warrant against him has put his international travel on hold.

Ukraine suspicious of Ramaphosa's motives

While the African delegation was at pains to underline its neutrality, their hosts in Kyiv were skeptical, especially in respect of the South African president.

Cyril Ramaphosa's ANC party has had close ties with Moscow for decades, but recent allegations that South Africa supplied Russia with arms have only added to suspicions.

"There were no high expectations considering the positions [the African delegation] were coming with,” says Ukrainian foreign policy analyst Hanna Shelest. 

Ukraine's government had hoped that seeing the realities of war with their own eyes might have shifted their guests' stance, Shelest added.

But there were no condemnations of Russia's record in occupied Ukraine, and even Russia's missile attack on Kyiv on the day of their visit barely elicited a response.

When Egyptian Prime Minister Mostafa Madbouly referred to Russia's invasion of Ukraine as a "conflict," Zelenskyy made no effort to hide his frustration at the joint press conference.

Grain deal under threat

If the timing of this visit was less than ideal for launching peace talks, it certainly made sense in terms of the one consequence of this war that has touched the lives of hundreds of millions of Africans: food prices.

The Black Sea grain deal, which commits Russia to loosen its blockade of Ukrainian ports and allow grain exports, expires on July 17. African leaders were adamant that the deal must be extended. But the signals from the Kremlin are not promising.

While Russia has often let negotiations run down to the wire and even withdrawn from the deal for a matter of days, analysts say this time around it might be more than brinkmanship.

Russia says that Western sanctions on Russian banks and the insurance market are indirectly hampering exports of its fertilizers and foodstuffs, which are otherwise exempt from sanctions.

Putin blames West for rising food prices

Vladimir Putin told African leaders in St Petersburg that it was not Russia's war against Ukraine that had caused food prices to spiral, but instead Western countries' economic policies during the COVID-19 pandemic that were to blame.

Putin has previously accused Ukraine of acting in bad faith, using the Black Sea grain deal to sell its produce to Europe rather than to developing nations. The fact that those very same developing nations asked him to commit to the Black Sea grain deal made little obvious impression on the Russian leader.

Instead, the African delegation received a loose commitment from Vladimir Putin that Russia would provide limited volumes of grain free of charge to the poorest nations — a move which analysts predict is unlikely to be large enough in scale to soften the blow of rising prices if the current grain deal ends.

Unless they can convince the West to make face-saving concessions to Putin to keep the current deal alive, African leaders need to prepare for the very real possibility that food prices could soon return to their 2022 highs.

Edited by Helen Whittle.