Consensual statement ends Buenos Aires summit
ADVERTISEMENTThe G20 summit closed with an agreed communiqué, but world leaders skirted round many of the most contentious issues. Euronews correspondent Vincent McAviney sends this report from Buenos Aires:
“This year’s G20 here in Buenos Aires has now drawn to a close with all the world leaders in attendance agreeing to a joint communique. The summit was meant to be all about tackling issues of world trade, climate change and tax reform. The communique notes though that there are deep divisions when it comes to trade, and there’s no outright criticism of some of the protectionist activity we’ve seen over the past couple of years. Now on the urging of French President Emmanuel Macron and Prime Minister Theresa May, there’s recognition that the WTO is in urgent need of reform. The communique says that its currently falling short of its main objectives. Prime Minister Theresa May was of course trying to sell her Brexit deal to fellow world leaders in order to gather more support back home for that difficult House of Commons vote coming up. She says that’s lots of the world leaders she met were receptive. She was selling a vision of global Britain and saying despite what you heard from President Trump last week, we are ready to do deals once Brexit has been completed. But the Prime Minister did receive a warning from Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe against the possibility of no deal and the disruption it could cause to global trade and to the global economy. Now the others issues that couldn’t be avoided were Jamal Khashoggi, the murdered journalist. The Crown Prince of Saudi Arabia was here and he had a warm reception from someone enjoying also a pariah status, the Russian President Vladimir Putin, but it was frosty from the other world leaders. The Prime Minister Theresa May said in her meeting with the Crown Prince that what had happened was unacceptable and that there needed to be a proper investigation with repercussions for those involved. Now President Trump cancelled his meeting with President Putin because of his actions in the Ukraine and we weren’t treated to his usual wide ranging press conference at the end of this summit because he said it wouldn’t be appropriate to do so after the passing of Former President H W Bush."