The reunification of a “dysfunctional” family: This is how the UN chief described the G20 summit on Friday, which aims for compromises on the economy and climate but remains deeply divided over the war in Ukraine.
Most leaders arrived in New Delhi on Friday to attend a two-day meeting on Saturday and Sunday.
It will take place without Russian President Vladimir Putin and Chinese President Xi Jinping, whose absence raises questions about the relevance of this major diplomatic rally.
The G20 was born in 2008 out of a desire to regulate global finance, but then failed when it brought together old industrialized nations and emerging economies.
AFP
Joe Biden, seeking to take the seat vacated by his major rivals, began a bilateral meeting with Narendra Modi on Friday.
The Indian Prime Minister, whose face is omnipresent on the panels welcoming delegations in New Delhi, wants to use this summit of the world’s twenty leading economies to assert his place in the world diplomatic hierarchy.
AFP
The Hindu nationalist head of government and the democratic president praised the “solid and enduring partnership” between their two countries in a joint press release after a closed-door meeting, of which the Indian government distributed very pleasing pictures.
They no longer leave each other, at least almost: their meeting follows Narendra Modi’s state visit to the White House in June.
And the Indian prime minister said he was “impatient” to host the American president again next year at a meeting of the Quad (Japan, Australia, India, United States), a diplomatic format that Washington has relaunched to appeal to China demonstrate.
The absence of Chinese and Russian leaders “is a disappointment for India,” commented Kurt Campbell, an adviser to Joe Biden. “For our Indian interlocutors, it is both gratifying and reassuring that the United States is there,” he said.
Americans want to use their full weight at a time when the global family is proving “dysfunctional,” United Nations Secretary-General Antonio Guterres lamented on Friday.
“Divisions increase, tensions explode and trust ebbs – which (taken together) raise the specter of fragmentation and ultimately confrontation,” he said.
However, Kurt Campbell on the American side assured that the negotiations on the climate and on the language that would appear on the subject in the final communiqué of the meeting had made progress.
On the other hand, regarding Ukraine, in an exchange with the press, he indicated that disagreements persist: “The United States and its allies remain focused, resolute and determined on what concerns Ukraine, and we have this told everyone very clearly.” Interlocutor.”
G20 host country India failed to comply with sanctions against Moscow after the invasion. And other emerging economies are refusing to join the West.
The USA is aware of this and in any case has economic priority in New Delhi: to strengthen the financing capacities of the World Bank in particular in order to offer an alternative to the gigantic Chinese investment plans, the “New Silk Roads”. ”
Russia will be represented in New Delhi by Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov, who already sets the tone in a statement: “We are working closely with all G20 countries to (…) combat attempts to explain humanitarian and economic problems in the USA. ” World only by “the conflict in Ukraine”.
China sends Prime Minister Li Qiang.
On Thursday, Mr Modi reiterated his desire to expand the bloc into the G21 and “include the African Union as a permanent member”. A project that, rarely seen at the G20, seems to be reaching more or less consensus.