G20: Bali preps for everything from security risks to tsunamis

Biden to press Xi on N Korea in G20 talks

Indonesia on Tuesday will host the G20 leaders' summit, gathering the globe's most powerful figures together on the resort island of Bali instead of the traffic-clogged capital Jakarta. Nineteen leaders - bar Russian President Vladimir Putin - will seek solutions to myriad global crises on the Muslim-majority country's mostly Hindu "Island of Gods".

Preparations for 20 national delegations, plus other prominent international figures including the heads of the United Nations and FIFA, are well under way, aimed at ensuring the summit passes without incident 20 years after a major bombing killed more than 200 people on the island.

"I have inspected the smallest aspects (of the venues) since this morning. We have checked everything, and I want to convey that we are ready to receive the G20 guests," Indonesian President Joko Widodo said this week, according to state news agency Antara.

Meanwhile, US President Joe Biden arrived in Asia on Saturday vowing to urge Chinese leader Xi Jinping to rein in North Korea when they hold their first face-to-face meeting at next week's G20 summit.

Biden met Southeast Asian leaders in Phnom Penh ahead of his encounter with his Chinese counterpart on Monday in Bali. The meeting between the two powers comes after a recordbreaking spate of missile tests by North Korea sent fears soaring that the reclusive state would soon conduct its seventh nuclear test.

In Monday's meeting on the sidelines of the G20 summit, Biden will tell Xi that China - Pyongyang's biggest ally - has "an interest in playing a constructive role in restraining North Korea's worst tendencies", US National Security Advisor Jake Sullivan told reporters. Biden will also tell Xi that if North Korea's missile and nuclear build-up "keeps going down this road, it will simply mean further enhanced American military and security presence in the region".

Sullivan said Biden would not make demands on China but rather give Xi "his perspective". This is that "North Korea represents a threat not just to the United States, not just to (South Korea) and Japan but to peace and stability across the entire region".

Whether China wants to increase pressure on North Korea is "of course up to them", Sullivan said. However, with North Korea rapidly ramping up its missile capacities, "the operational situation is more acute in the current moment", Sullivan said.

Here's how authorities in the G20's only Southeast Asian member have been preparing for the global stage, and for thousands of delegates to descend on an island that is witnessing a tourism revival after two years of being slammed by the Covid19 pandemic.

The security measures, dubbed Operation Puri Agung, will see 18,000 military and police officers deployed to the Nusa Dua area of Bali, popular with tourists.

The heads of state will move between their 24 designated hotels and the summit venue - the Apurva Kempinski - inside a security ring protected by the Indonesian military, with outer rings manned by the country's police force.