The summit of the most industrialized countries is held until Wednesday in the Bavarian Alps. On the program: the war in Ukraine and its consequences on emerging countries, food supplies and the outbreak of energy prices.
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Since the annexation of Crimea by Russia, in 2014, the G8 has become G7 again, and the Russian president, Vladimir Putin, is no longer present in the traditional family photo which brings together, each year, leaders of the seven most industrialized countries (Germany, Canada, United States, France, Italy, Japan, United Kingdom) and the European Union (EU).
But the chief of the Kremlin remembered their good memory, Sunday, June 26, exploding four missiles in kyiv a few hours before the opening of the G7 summit in the south of Germany. These Russian strikes, the first for several weeks against the Ukrainian capital, touched a residential area, killing and six injured, including a 7 -year -old girl. They come under “barbarism”, condemned the American president, Joe Biden, by finding his counterparts.
Even without these new bombings against kyiv, the war in Ukraine would have occupied most of the discussions of this summit anyway, which is held until Wednesday in the bucolic setting of the Château d’Elmau, in the heart of the Alps Bavarian. A summit whose aim is to tighten the ranks inside the Western camp, while the extension of the conflict has been able to reveal differences on the objectives of the support provided to kyiv and on the modalities of a possible ceasements- Fire, inaccessible to date due to the intensity of the fighting in the Donbass, where the Russians have just taken control of the city of Sievierodonetsk.
Anxious to send a strong signal, Joe Biden and the British Prime Minister, Boris Johnson, took the lead by announcing, on Sunday, an embargo on Russian gold imports, even before the decision did not be acted by the entire G7. While Russian gold sales abroad represented around 14.6 billion euros in 2021, their ban would deprive owners of this metal from a means allowing them to limit the impact of Western sanctions, explains Downing Street, particularly proactive on this file.
“We are not in a climbing search”
Such a measure would allow the members of the G7 to show that they intend to put Russia under pressure a little more, without going so far as to develop a new sanctions train after that decided, on June 3, by the UE, which includes the establishment of a Russian oil embargo by the end of the year. “We are not in a climbing search but rather to ensure that what we have decided, which is already very powerful, is perfectly coordinated,” says the Elysée. As a prelude, the French president, Emmanuel Macron, and Boris Johnson tried to warm up their relationship, electrified by Brexit. Not without a small spade of the British leader, who underlined after their tête-à-tête, that “any attempt to settle the conflict now would only cause sustainable instability”.
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