As this year's chair Foreign Minister of Cambodia Prak Sokhonn has invited Russia to attend the Association of Southeast Asian Nation meetings scheduled in early August.
In conversation with foreign diplomatic corps on Wednesday, Prak Sokhonn, who is also Cambodia's deputy prime minister, informed that he has asked the Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov to be a part of the ASEAN regional forum, the Bangkok Post reported.
Ever since the war began 5 months ago, Moscow's participation in international gatherings and events has been a hot topic of discussion. Therefore, this decision is expected to cause a lot of ruckus in the international community which is divided in its opinion to the Russian invasion of Ukraine.
In protest of the war, many meetings have also witnessed top officials from major powers like US, Canada and UK walking out over Russian participation.
Russian leader Vladimir Putin is unperturbed by this move of the West as he believes that their attempts to isolate Moscow will also result in negatively impacting their own economies, as per Business Standard.
Putin mentioned that the absence of a world policeman allows every nation to pursue their own independent policy. Addressing the failure of the West in imposing sanctions and restrictions on Moscow, Putin simply called all their attempts 'futile.'
As of now there has been no positive response received from Moscow confirming the participation of Lavrov however, according to a government source the foreign minister is "very highly likely" to attend, Kyodo News reported.
Apart from the controversial invite sent to Russia, Cambodia has also asked Myanmar to participate in the discussions as a "non-political representative." The Cambodian Foreign Minister decided to go ahead with this plan after his recent visit to Myanmar.
The security forces in Burma have engaged in widespread and systematic attacks on civilians after a coup ousted the democratic government of Aung San Suu Kyi in February last year.
The Southeast Asian country is also did not receive any invitations for any recent ASEAN related meetings.
