Canada says G20 can’t work with Russia at the table

Canadian Foreign Minister Chrystia Freeland speaks to reporters outside the office of the United States Trade Representative in Washington, US, August 28, 2018. (Reuters)/Chris Watty/File Photo

Canada’s finance minister said on Friday, after a week of protests over Moscow’s war in Ukraine at meetings of the International Monetary Fund and World Bank, that the G20 could not function effectively as long as Russia was a member of it. in Washington.

Disagreement over Russia’s attendance at the meetings remained evident throughout the week, with officials from the United States, Canada, Britain and other Western countries organizing strikes for three consecutive days whenever Russian officials spoke. Read more

G-20 finance ministers and central bank governors, who met in Washington on Wednesday, failed to agree on their traditional statement outlining economic policy goals as Russia blocked strong language condemning its invasion of Ukraine.

The steering committee of the International Monetary Fund, the Development Committee of the World Bank and the International Monetary Fund also failed to issue joint statements. Read more

“The G20 cannot work effectively with Russia at the table,” Canadian Finance Minister Chrystia Freeland said at a news conference with Ukrainian Finance Minister Serhiy Marchenko in Washington.

“Russia has no place at the table of countries that have come together to preserve global economic prosperity,” Freeland said, adding that Russia had violated long-standing international rules by invading southern Ukraine. “You cannot be a hunter and a gamekeeper at the same time.”

The tensions have raised questions about the effectiveness of the G-20, which includes Western countries that have accused Moscow of committing war crimes in Ukraine, as well as China, India, Indonesia and South Africa, which have not joined Western-led sanctions against Russia over the war. conflict.

Indonesian Finance Minister Sri Mulyani Indrawati told Reuters in an interview that this year’s G20 host Indonesia remains optimistic that progress can be made on a number of issues despite the tensions.

Even with the exit, “we all agree” on the gist of the work to be done, Indrawati said.

Indrawati said she is focusing more on “grassroots” technical work behind issues such as strengthening the G-20 joint debt framework for poor countries, and creating a new financing mechanism for future pandemic needs, than issuing a statement at the current stage.

Other G20 financial meetings are scheduled for July and October and the Leaders Summit in November, Indrawati said there is plenty of time to continue the progress.

“If there was no forum at all, the world would be in a much worse place,” with each country setting its own policies without regard to others.

Freeland, who is of Ukrainian descent, has made impassioned pleas on behalf of Ukraine since Russia invaded the country in late February. Read more

On Thursday, she directly addressed Russian Finance Minister Anton Siluanov, who has almost joined the IMF meeting, saying his participation was “deviant and ridiculous” because “your war is making us poorer,” according to a source. Read more

Russia describes its actions in Ukraine as a “special operation”.

(Reporting by David Lauder and Andrea Shalal in Washington and Steve Shearer in Ottawa; Editing by Chizu Nomiyama, Paul Simao and Chris Reese

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