Putin to host Asean leaders in first summit since Ukraine invasion

[MOSCOW] Russian President Vladimir Putin will host leaders of Asean, with energy security likely to top the agenda of their first summit since Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine.

President Ferdinand Marcos Jr of the Philippines, as well as Prime Minister Anwar Ibrahim of Malaysia and his Thai counterpart Anutin Charnvirakul are among those expected to attend the event starting Wednesday (Jun 17) in Kazan, some 800 km east of Moscow.

It is the first in-person meeting between the Russian leader and the Asean group since 2018, when they declared a “strategic partnership” in Singapore. A 2021 summit was held online because of the Covid-19 pandemic.

Russia has emerged as a key energy supplier to South-east Asia after the US-Israel war on Iran triggered the effective closure of the Strait of Hormuz, choking off oil and gas crucial for the region of 680 million people. While a deal to end the Middle East conflict may be signed this week, the crisis pushed several Asean members to pursue energy supply cooperation with Moscow, helping ease its isolation.

“The US-Iran conflict has led to energy shortages and price rises, and Putin will offer to mitigate their energy problems by increasing oil and gas exports and building nuclear power plants,” said Ian Storey, a principal fellow at the ISeaS-Yusof Ishak Institute in Singapore.

The two-day Russia-Asean meeting overlaps with the Group of Seven summit in France, where European leaders are seeking US President Donald Trump’s support for their effort to draw Putin into negotiations on a deal to end the war in Ukraine that’s now in its fifth year.

“It will send a strong signal from Russia to the West that Russia isn’t isolated,” said Alexander Korolev, an expert on Asean at the Higher School of Economics in Moscow. The visit by Asean leaders shows that “against the background of the Middle East conflict, they are starting to regard Russia as an important option in terms of ensuring energy and food security.”

The Kremlin is also pushing the geopolitical concept of a Great Eurasian Partnership involving closer cooperation between the Moscow-dominated Eurasian Union, China-led Shanghai Cooperation Organization and Asean.

Putin will have “a marathon” of bilateral talks with Asean leaders, according to Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov, who did not provide specifics. The group’s 11 members are the Philippines, Singapore, Indonesia, Malaysia, Vietnam, Thailand, Cambodia, Myanmar, Laos, Brunei and Timor-Leste.

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A comprehensive action plan for 2026-2030 to expand cooperation in areas including security, energy, trade, agriculture, investment and technology will be adopted at the summit, Kremlin foreign policy aide Yuri Ushakov told reporters on Tuesday.

The Philippines, a US treaty ally, began taking Russian crude oil in March to replace lost Middle East supply, after Washington issued sanctions waivers. Marcos, who chairs Asean this year, will hold a bilateral meeting with Putin, where they plan to discuss energy and food security, according to a Philippine foreign affairs spokesman.

Malaysia’s Anwar this week said he plans to ensure continued supplies of oil from Putin. “This is the benefit of maintaining good relations with others,” he said.

Indonesia, South-east Asia’s biggest economy, has been discussing oil and gas cooperation, potential nuclear energy development, military training and defence ties, as well as agricultural trade including wheat and fertilisers. Jakarta also recently opened up the country to imports of Russian beef.

For Thailand, “Russia plays a crucial role in global supply chains, including energy, fertilisers and raw materials essential to the production sector,” said a spokeswoman for the prime minister. “Meanwhile, Thailand has potential in agricultural products, food, and processed industries, which can be further developed to expand trade value.”

Still, Russia’s overall economic footprint in South-east Asia remains limited despite growing engagement. Two-way trade reached US$18.1 billion in 2024, while Russian investment inflows to the group totalled US$474 million, according to Asean data.

Even amid unprecedented sanctions over the war, Russia’s trade with the European Union totalled US$63.5 billion in 2025, according to data compiled by Bloomberg.

Nowhere has Russia’s influence expanded more markedly in the Asean region than in Myanmar, where the military regime turned to Moscow for weapons, energy cooperation and diplomatic support after being shunned by much of the West following a 2021 coup. Its leader Min Aung Hlaing will be in China this week, though, as Myanmar has been essentially excluded from participating in Asean leader-level events since the takeover.

While relations with Vietnam have also been among the closest, Prime Minister Le Minh Hung will lead its delegation rather than Communist Party chief and President To Lam. The two countries in March signed an agreement to develop a Russian nuclear power plant in Vietnam, as well as a preliminary supply deal for Russian liquefied natural gas.

Singapore’s Prime Minister Lawrence Wong will also attend the summit, his office said. It will be the first visit by a Singaporean leader since the 2022 invasion, and Russia labelling it an “unfriendly” state after it joined the international sanctions in response.

However, Singapore was Russia’s third-largest trade partner among Asean states last year behind Indonesia and Vietnam, according to data compiled by Bloomberg. Senior Minister Lee Hsien Loong said in January that imposing sanctions “does not mean we are hostile to Russia”.

“We still have relations, we still do business with them,” Lee said. BLOOMBERG