THE WEEK AHEAD Monday: Today is the International Day against Drug Abuse and Illicit Trafficking — a U.N. effort to strengthen cooperation on ending drug abuse. NATO Secretary General Jens Stoltenberg travels to Lithuania to prepare for next month’s summit in Vilnius. He will be accompanied by the chair of the NATO Military Committee, Admiral Rob Bauer. Tuesday: Chinese Premier Li Qiang will deliver a keynote speech at the World Economic Forum’s 14th annual meeting, known as “Summer Davos” in June. The prime ministers of Barbados, Mongolian, New Zealand and Vietnam are expected to attend the summit, according to Beijing’s foreign ministry. Countries across the Middle East including Bahrain, Kuwait, the United Arab Emirates and Saudi Arabia celebrate the first day of Eid al-Adha, one of two major holidays on the Islamic calendar. The celebration commemorates the Quranic tale of Prophet Ibrahim. The EU’s flagship biodiversity law is heading for a decisive vote in the European Parliament’s environment committee. Thursday-Friday EU heads of state and government meet in Brussels for a summit to address topics including Russia’s war in Ukraine and are also expected to discuss the European Economic Security Strategy. Recently unveiled by Commission President Ursula von der Leyen, the strategy is aimed at potentially banning companies from making sensitive tech in China. Saturday: Spain takes over the rotating presidency of Council of the EU for the next six months, guiding policy agendas and debates among national representatives. Prime Minister Pedro Sánchez has outlined Madrid’s four priorities, which include making Europe less dependent on foreign manufacturers and making the economy greener. Ukraine peace plans in Denmark Top politicians from more than a dozen countries — including all G-7 nations, as well as India, Turkey, Brazil, South Africa and Saudi Arabia, but not Russia or China — gathered in Copenhagen over the weekend to lay out plans for a future peace in Ukraine and work toward a “peace summit,” according to a senior EU official who spoke to POLITICO’s Brussels Playbook, on condition of anonymity. Ukraine ‘peace summit’: The aim is to rally an international consensus around the idea of peace for Ukraine, building on the 10-point plan presented by Zelenskyy last year. While no date for the summit has been set, the official said it was most likely to take place “after the summer break.” Would you kindly join us? Asked how it was possible to plan for peace without the aggressor, Russia, the official said a potential blueprint was the Black Sea grain initiative for moving agricultural goods out of Ukraine’s under-siege ports. This deal had first been discussed by Turkey and the U.N. before Russia came on board. As for China’s absence, the official said that “several requests” for Beijing’s participation had been extended. “Both the global south countries as well as the G-7 regretted that China did not participate,” the official said, adding that Beijing would be “invited again.” Mutiny effect: Did the Wagner mutiny lend extra urgency to the gathering? Although leaders were keeping tabs on the events, they stayed focused on the peace plan. “It’s far too early to judge to say in which direction this will go,” said the official. Black diplomats feel alienated by U.S. State Department Ambassadors of color are calling on the Biden administration to live up to its commitment to combat deeply-entrenched diversity issues plaguing the U.S. State Department, which have been widely reported by POLITICO and others. “There will be many people who will be very glad to see me walk out the door Friday, because I have stayed on them. But I have also put in place other people who will stay on them,” said the State Department’s first chief diversity and inclusion officer, Ambassador Gina Abercrombie-Winstanley on Sunday, as she prepares to retire. Without naming names, Abercrombie-Winstanley added that the State Department has not flushed out “toxic rock stars,” who have earned a “reputation for not supporting diversity and inclusion [and] … engendering a toxic work environment.” In March, POLITICO’s Daniel Lippman reported the State Department ended its policy to issue assignment restrictions as a condition of granting security clearance. The policy was perceived as discriminatory as it appeared to disproportionately affect Asian American and Pacific Islanders. Under the Biden administration, minority members of the foreign service remain underrepresented, and the inequality gap has barely budged since minority staff made up 12.5 percent of employees by the end of the 1980s. “In 2021 or 2022, the diversity situation in the State Department was worse than it was in 1980,” said Charles Ray, the former U.S. ambassador to Cambodia and Zimbabwe, adding changes were often made with the agency “kicking and screaming all the way.” The State Department has previously emphasized its desire to maintain a diverse workforce. “The only way to ensure our foreign policy delivers for the American people is to recruit and retain a workforce that truly reflects the American people,” Blinken said in a statement earlier this month, vowing to continue to press the issue after Abercrombie-Winstanley’s departure. VICTORY FOR GREEK CONSERVATIVES: Greece’s conservatives won big in Sunday's parliamentary elections, securing an outright majority and a second term as prime minister for Kyriakos Mitsotakis. Far-right parties also made gains, while the left struggled, giving Greece’s parliament its most rightward slant since the restoration of democracy in 1974, per our own Nektaria Stamouli. Mitsotakis’ New Democracy party won 158 seats in the country’s 300-seat parliament, under a new electoral system that awards the winning party 50 bonus seats.
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