The Group of Seven have scolded both China and Russia, casting the Kremlin as malicious and Beijing as a bully, but beyond words there were few concrete steps aside from expressing support for Taiwan and Ukraine.
Subscribe now for unlimited access.
$0/
(min cost $0)
or signup to continue reading
Founded in 1975 as a forum for the world's richest countries to discuss crises such as the OPEC oil embargo, the G7 this week addressed what it perceives as the biggest current threats: China, Russia and the coronavirus pandemic.
G7 foreign ministers, in a 12,400-word communique, said Russia was trying to undermine democracies and threatening Ukraine while China was guilty of human rights abuses and of using its economic clout to bully others.
There was, however, little concrete action mentioned in the communique that would unduly worry either Chinese President Xi Jinping or Russian President Vladimir Putin.
Representatives from the UK, the US, Canada, France, Germany, Italy, Japan and the European Union said they would bolster collective efforts to stop China's "coercive economic policies" and to counter Russian disinformation.
Non G7-members India, Australia, South Korea, South Africa and the chair of the Association of Southeast Asian Nations were also invited to join the talks on Wednesday in London.
"I think (China is) more likely to need to, rather than react in anger, it is more likely going to need to take a look in the mirror and understand that it needs to take into account this growing body of opinion, that thinks these basic international rules have got to be adhered to," UK Foreign Secretary Dominic Raab said.
The Russian government denies it is meddling beyond its borders and says the US and its allies are gripped by anti-Russian hysteria.
Chinese authorities say many of G7 countries are bullies with a post-imperial mindset that makes them feel they can act like global policemen.
China's spectacular economic and military rise over the past 40 years is among the most significant geopolitical events of recent history, alongside the 1991 fall of the Soviet Union that ended the Cold War.
"We will work collectively to foster global economic resilience in the face of arbitrary, coercive economic policies and practices," the G7 ministers said on China.
They said they supported Taiwan's participation in World Health Organisation forums and the World Health Assembly - and expressed concerns about "any unilateral actions that could escalate tensions" in the Taiwan Strait.
China regards Taiwan as its own territory and opposes any official Taiwanese representation on an international level.
On Russia, the G7 was similarly supportive of Ukraine but offered little beyond words.
"We are deeply concerned that the negative pattern of Russia's irresponsible and destabilising behaviour continues," G7 ministers said.
"This includes the large build-up of Russian military forces on Ukraine's borders and in illegally-annexed Crimea, its malign activities aimed at undermining other countries' democratic systems, its malicious cyber activity, and (its) use of disinformation."
On the coronavirus pandemic, the G7 pledged to work with industry to expand the production of affordable COVID-19 vaccines but stopped short of calling for a waiver of intellectual property rights of major pharma firms.
"We commit to working with industry to facilitate expanded manufacturing at scale of affordable COVID-19 vaccines, therapeutics and diagnostics and their component parts," the G7 foreign ministers said in a joint statement.
They said the work would include "promoting partnerships between companies, and encouraging voluntary licensing and tech transfer agreements on mutually agreed terms".
Australian Associated Press
