Union Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman with Reserve Bank of India Governor Shaktikanta Das and other dignitaries during the 1st G20 Finance Ministers and Central Bank Governors meeting, in BengaluruWith China and Russia itself reluctant to sign, the heads of finance of the world’s top countries were unable to reach an agreement on an united statement denouncing Russia for its war on Ukraine on Saturday.
India, which was hosting a summit in Bengaluru as chair of the Group of 20 (G20) economies, was hesitant to bring up the war, but Western countries argued they could not support any decision that did not include a denunciation.
India released a “chair’s summary and outcome document” that only summarised the two days of negotiations and listed disputes due to the lack of agreement among G20 nations.
According to the report, the majority of members “strongly condemned the war in Ukraine and stressed that it is causing immense human suffering and exacerbating existing fragilities in the global economy,” citing supply chain disruption, risks to financial stability, and ongoing energy and food insecurity.
The sanctions imposed by the United States, European nations, and other nations to punish Russia for the invasion and deprive it of revenue were described as having “alternative opinions and various appraisals of the situation and sanctions” in the statement.
The result was comparable to the G20 summit’s in Bali last November, where the host nation Indonesia similarly released a closing statement noting differences. The G20, which was established more than 20 years ago to address economic crises, has battled more and more to come to an agreement to release a formal end-of-meeting communique.
The Indian finance minister Nirmala Sitharaman said, “We still think we’ve made some progress in getting all the ministers on board, even if there wasn’t really a communique, just an outcome statement.
China’s decision to not sign the declaration, according to German Finance Minister Christian Lindner, is disappointing.
Prior to this, US Treasury Secretary Janet Yellen stated that any statement must “absolutely necessary” rebuke Russia. Russia and China did not want the G20 platform to be used to debate political issues, two delegates told Reuters.
In order to avoid using the terms “invasion” or “war,” Russia, a G20 member but not a G7 member, has referred to its actions in Ukraine as a “special military operation”.
India has mostly maintained a neutral position, refusing to place the blame for the invasion on Russia, looking for a diplomatic settlement, and dramatically increasing its purchases of Russian oil.
When the UN unanimously voted on Thursday to urge that Moscow withdraw its soldiers from Ukraine and end the conflict, China and India were among the countries that chose to abstain.
Together with the G7 nations, the G20 group also consists of nations like Saudi Arabia, Australia, and Brazil.
Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, a move that upends the basis of the world order, is making it impossible for the G20 to have productive discussions, Japanese Finance Minister Shunichi Suzuki told reporters.
On the sidelines, the International Monetary Fund (IMF) met with the World Bank, China, India, Saudi Arabia, and the G7 on Saturday to discuss restructuring debt for troubled economies, but Kristalina Georgieva, the IMF’s managing director, noted that there were also differences among the participants.
The resolve to overcome disagreements for the sake of nations was evident during the session that just ended, according to Georgieva, who co-chaired the roundtable with the Indian Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman.
One delegate told Reuters that while some initial progress was achieved, namely in the vocabulary used to debate the issue, detailed discussion of reorganisation was omitted.
No “deliverables” were made from the conference, which was primarily organisational, according to Yellen.
Around the time of the IMF and World Bank meetings in April, additional consultations are scheduled.
The largest bilateral creditor in the world, China, has been under increasing pressure from other countries to drastically reduce the amount of loans it provides to struggling developing countries.
Chinese Finance Minister Liu Kun repeated Beijing’s view that the World Bank and other multilateral development banks should also take part in debt relief by taking haircuts in a video presentation to the G20 conference on Friday.
At the meeting, more people supported India’s desire for stricter regulation of private cryptocurrency assets.
Georgieva argued that if regulation fails, officials “should not take off the table” the possibility of outright prohibitions. Yellen does not support such prohibitions but emphasised the importance of establishing a robust regulatory system.
