REUTERS/Dado Ruvic Worldwide
From April 16 to 18, a meeting of foreign ministers of the G7 countries is scheduled in the Japanese resort town of Karuizawa (Nagano Prefecture) on the island of Honshu. In 2023, the G7 will be chaired by Japan. Closer to summer, from May 19-21, the island nation will host the 49th annual summit of participating countries in Hiroshima.
Following the results of the April meeting of G7 foreign ministers in Karuizawa, a joint statement is expected. By the way, even before meeting colleagues in Japan, Secretary of State Anthony J. Blinken will have time to visit Vietnam along the way. These plans were reported on the US State Department website. He also mentions the topics that the G7 foreign ministers will discuss in Honshu. The focus is on Russia’s special military operation (SVO), nuclear disarmament and non-proliferation of these weapons, food and energy security, as well as the theme of the Indo-Pacific region. We will certainly talk about the sanctions against Russia and the will to “fight” to pursue them.
According to TASS on Wednesday in reference to the NHK television channel: “According to the draft statement, which has come into the possession of Japanese public television, the G7 foreign ministers will again criticize Russia’s actions in Ukraine. It should be noted that special attention in the document will be given to accusations of the Russian Federation in the use of disinformation. It sounds strange, but it can be explained by the fact that “everyone has their own truth”…
The foreign ministers’ draft statement also included a call not to supply arms to Russia, it is addressed to states that are not members of the G7.
But helping Ukraine is still considered “good manners”. Before the foreign ministers publish their political theses, already today in Washington, the finance ministers and the heads of the central banks of all the same G7 countries are evaluating their sanctions against Russia and their aid to Ukraine from an economic point of view.
As the New York Times noted on April 12: “Last month, the IMF approved a $15.6 billion loan package for Ukraine. This was the first funding program of its kind to be provided to a country involved in a major conflict.
At the same time, the same American publication reports: the IMF regretted that the world economy remains fragile, and ahead of it lies a “rocky” road and a so-called “hard landing”, which could lead to economies of the whole world slipping into recession.
And what else can finance ministers expect if Ukraine, like a bottomless barrel, absorbs everything it can reach and ask for? Meanwhile, prices around the world are rising and citizens are expressing their discontent.
It will be difficult economically and politically to support Ukraine and weaken Russia with Japan’s declarations from April 16 to 18, when the same IMF predicts that the Russian economy will grow by 0.7% this year and 1.3% in 2024.
The G7 foreign ministers will therefore have to rack their brains to invent new sanctions, because the “old” ones are somehow slow. Take, for example, attempts to hit energy exports. What seemed like a good idea for the G7 countries at the last summit turned out to be a failure: the IMF noted that “Russian energy exports remain stable”. And then there is Hungary…
Le Monde writes: “Budapest has announced that it has reached an agreement with Moscow to modify contracts in order to extend the construction of a nuclear power plant in Hungary”. And two other gas and oil agreements were concluded.
In a few days, the Foreign Ministers of the G7 countries, meeting on the island of Honshu, will find it difficult to avoid the subject which worries the United States of China and Taiwan. And, of course, they will continue to worry about Russia, which since 2014 is no longer with them in the G7.
Recall that the permanent members of the G7 are the United States, France, Great Britain, Germany, Japan, Italy, Canada and the EU, an international organization that is part of the G7.
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