G7 ends with Ukraine in focus as Zelenskyy meets leaders

HIROSHIMA, JAPAN >> Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy huddled with some of his biggest backers as the Group of Seven summit closed in Hiroshima on Sunday, building momentum for his country’s war effort even as Russia claimed a battlefield victory that was quickly disputed by Ukraine.

The Ukrainian leader’s in-person appearance in his trademark olive drab underscored the centrality of the war for the G7 bloc of rich democracies. It also stole much of the limelight from other priorities, including security challenges in Asia and outreach to the developing world, that the leaders focused on at the threeday gathering.

Hosting Japanese Prime Minister Fumio Kishida said the group was committed to “strong backing for Ukraine from every possible dimension.”

Zelenskyy held two major rounds of meetings Sunday, one with G7 leaders and a second with them and a host of invited guests including India and South Korea. He also spoke one-on-one with several leaders.

Hanging over Sunday’s talks was the Russian claim that forces of the Wagner private army and Russian troops had seized the Ukrainian city of Bakhmut. The eight-month battle for the eastern city — seen by both sides as a major symbolic prize — has been the longest and likely bloodiest of the war.

Even before Zelenskyy landed Saturday, the G7 nations had unveiled a slew of new sanctions and other measures meant to punish Moscow over its invasion that began in February last year.

While Ukraine dominated the summit, the leaders of Japan, the U.S., the United Kingdom, France, Germany, Canada and Italy, as well as the European Union, also aimed to address global worries over climate change, poverty, economic instability and nuclear proliferation.

Two U.S. allies — South Korea and Japan — furthered efforts to improve ties colored by lingering anger over issues linked to Japan’s brutal 1910-1945 colonization of the Korean Peninsula. Kishida and South Korean President Yoon Suk Yeol visited a memorial to Korean victims, many of them slave laborers, of the Aug. 6, 1945, atomic bombing.