Austrian Chancellor Karl Nehammer said on Saturday that preaching to the Western choir about the need to pressure Moscow over Ukraine is "not enough" and engaging countries in the global south is needed.
"We are like in a Western echo chamber. We are all in agreement, but that is not enough," said the Austrian head of government on the fringes of the two-day meeting on the Bürgenstock near Lucerne.
For the European Union and the United States, it was a matter of finding more allies to increase the pressure on Moscow in the Ukraine war.
"Without parts of Asia, Africa and South America, we will not be able to get the Russian Federation to change its mind," he said.
Countries such as India, Brazil, China and South Africa are particularly important here, he said. The fact that India and Brazil were represented at the meeting - albeit not at ministerial level - was a "first glimmer of hope," said Nehammer.
The two-day meeting of 92 states and eight international organizations aims to outline the first steps towards a possible peace process in the Ukraine war.
