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Yearender 2021: Jokowi takes Indonesian foreign policy in his stride
President Joko Widodo has shown greater assertion and confidence on both the national and the global stage this year, especially as Indonesia assumes the Group of 20 presidency.
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President Joko Widodo (center) strikes the symbolic gavel he received from Italian Prime Minister Mario Draghi (right) on Oct. 31, 2021, during the handover ceremony of the Group of 20 presidency at the La Nuvola convention center in Rome. (BPMI Setpres/Laily RE)
As the world prepares to exit the second year of the COVID-19 pandemic, President Joko “Jokowi” Widodo spent most of 2021 playing host to visiting dignitaries and limiting his in-person attendances at important international forums to a handful of virtual appearances.
However, the one time that Jokowi decided to head overseas, traveling to Italy, Scotland and the United Arab Emirates in late October, analysts say he made the very best of it, embarking on what was to be one of the most important foreign policy trips of his second term.
With international travel remaining largely limited due to the pandemic, Jokowi was among the last few global leaders to resume diplomatic visits, while others had cautiously started traveling overseas.
Pressing domestic issues, including the Delta-driven midyear surge in coronavirus infections, had forced the President to delegate most of his diplomatic tasks to Cabinet ministers, except his hosting duties.
His only trip abroad was to attend the Group of 20 Summit in Rome, an annual event he rarely skipped, and the United Nations Climate Change Conference (COP26) in Glasgow, followed by visits to Abu Dhabi and Dubai.
From the start of his second term in October 2019 and prior to his three-country tour in October 2021, the President made just three foreign visits, including to the UAE and Australia in early 2020 just weeks before COVID-19 was declared a “global pandemic”.
By comparison, he had made a total of 33 overseas trips by the end of the second year of his first term, in 2016.
