Stormy G20 ends with gestures for Trump on climate and trade
FRAGILE UNITY: The conclusions this year spelled out differences on core issues
HAMBURG: World leaders made concessions on trade and climate language to Donald Trump Saturday at the end of the most fractious and riothit G20 summit ever, in exchange for preserving a fragile unity of the club of major industrialised and emerging economies. In a departure from final summit declarations that tend to outline consensus on issues that range from fighting terrorism to financial governance, the extraordinary conclusions this year spelled out differences on core issues.
It acknowledged Trump’s decision to go his own way on taking the United States out of the 2015 Paris climate accord and clearly stated Washington’s wish to continue using and selling fossil fuels that are a main driver of global warming.
The declaration also stated for the first time the right of countries to protect their markets with “legitimate trade defence instruments” — wording that essentially gives Trump wiggle room to push on with his “America First” policy.
Trump, carried to the White House on a wave of public fury over deindustrialisation in vast areas of the United States, had launched “Buy American” and “Hire American” campaigns.
The nationalistic stance has set him on collision course with many of America’s allies, who warned Trump against an isolationist path and starting a round of trade war.
“Where there is no consensus, the communique spelt out the discord,” said host Chancellor Angela Merkel, who was praised by Russian President Vladimir Putin for finding an “optimal compromise” on the touchiest issue of climate.
French President Emmanuel Macron also hailed the approach, saying that the club found an “indispensable balance” through the text and halted any backsliding on fighting climate change, which is blamed for melting ice caps, rising seas and severe weather events.
The French leader, at his first G20 gathering, also took the opportunity to announce a new climate summit for December 12, which he said would focus on climate financing.
If the meetings within the tightly secured G20 summit venue were anything but harmonious, outside, chaos and violence gripped Germany’s second city.
On Saturday, thousands of antiriot cops were again on guard, as helicopters hovered overhead, with at least 20,000 demonstrators on the march again. Host Merkel herself admitted that “deep differences” remain with Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan after they met on the side- lines of the summit.
But it was Trump’s first head-tohead with Russia’s leader President Vladimir Putin that stole the show.
A day after Trump slammed Moscow’s actions in Ukraine and Syria, the two men had a “robust and lengthy exchange” about allegations of Russian meddling in the 2016 US election, Secretary of State Rex Tillerson said.
But Tillerson, who was present at the meeting that ran two hours and 15 minutes, also said the two alpha-male leaders “connected very quickly” with “very clear positive chemistry”.