G-20 summit in Germany to discuss terror, trade, climate
Host Merkel hopes to find 'compromises and answers' on a range of issues, and while there is little disagreement on fighting terrorism, prospects of finding common ground on climate change and trade look uncertain since Trump entered the White House half a year ago.
HAMBURG - The Group of 20 leaders' summit got underway Friday in the German port city of Hamburg in the wake of clashes between police and protesters, with terrorism, global trade and climate change among the issues on the agenda.
The meeting comes at a time of major shifts in the global geo-political landscape, with US President Donald Trump's "America First" policies pushing Europe and China closer together.
Trump will meet Russia's Vladimir Putin for the first time on Friday afternoon, an encounter that will be intensely scrutinised following allegations by US intelligence agencies that Moscow meddled in the US election to help Trump win.
Trump's bilateral with Putin was scheduled to take place just 15 minutes after the start of the discussion on climate, a scheduling conflict that could complicate a deal.
The summit also brings together Trump and Chinese President Xi Jinping at a time when Washington is ratcheting up pressure on Beijing to rein in North Korea after it test-launched an intercontinental ballistic missile and threatening the Chinese with punitive trade measures.
The host, German Chancellor Angela Merkel, said she hopes to find "compromises and answers" on a range of issues at the two-day meeting of leading industrial and developing nations. While there's little disagreement on fighting terrorism, prospects of finding common ground on climate change and trade look uncertain since Trump entered the White House half a year ago.
"Merkel, as the G20 host, must not sacrifice ambition for unity. Instead, we need a G19 commitment to climate action that demonstrates the intent to implement and even go beyond what 195 nations agreed to in Paris," said Jennifer Morgan of Greenpeace, referring to the climate accord Trump has pledged to leave.
Facing her own election in two months, Merkel met with Trump for one hour at a hotel in Hamburg on Thursday evening to try to overcome differences that envoys have been unable to settle in weeks of intense talks, including a last minute trip to Washington by the chancellor's top economic adviser.
The two leaders shook hands and smiled for the cameras, showing none of the tension that hung over their first two meetings, in Washington in March and on Trump's first trip to Europe in May. After that, the usually cautious Merkel said the United States was no longer a reliable partner and urged Europe to take its fate into its own hands.
"There is quite a delicate balance that Angela Merkel will have to navigate in a way, because it is not clear that being confrontational won't just create even more of a credibility problem for G20 cooperation," Indonesian Finance Minister Sri Mulyani Indrawati told Reuters in an interview.
A senior German official involved in the talks said he expected negotiators would be working around the clock to try to break the deadlock before Saturday, the final day of the summit.
On climate, sources told Reuters that US officials were pushing for a mention of fossil fuels as a viable alternative to cleaner energy sources and that the Europeans were resisting. In addition to the United States, Saudi Arabia was proving difficult to get on side.
On trade, the sources said that Washington was backtracking on language condemning protectionism that Trump agreed to at a Group of Seven meeting in Sicily in late May.
Hanging over the trade discussions is a threat by Washington to use a Cold War-era law to restrict steel imports based on national security concerns, a step that would hit the Chinese as well as partners in Europe.
German Foreign Minister Sigmar Gabriel suggested on Thursday that the measures could trigger a transatlantic trade war.
Violence on the streets
Merkel was born in Hamburg and she chose the city, a trading hub that helped launch the career of the Beatles, to send a message of openness.
The summit is being held only a few hundred metres from one of Germany's most potent symbols of left-wing resistance, a former theatre called the "Rote Flora" which was taken over by anti-capitalist squatters nearly three decades ago.
As leaders arrived on Thursday, riot police fired water cannon at a group of about a thousand black-clad protesters who hurled bottles in a demonstration organizers had dubbed "Welcome to Hell."
Some 20,000 police from all of Germany's 16 states have been deployed on the streets of Hamburg. They will be facing off against up to 100,000 protesters, including an estimated 8,000 who police say are prepared to use violence.
Police said that at least 76 officers were hurt in skirmishes with protesters, with one officer taken to a hospital with an eye injury after a firework exploded in front of him.
On Friday morning, dozens of protesters attempted to block cars from accessing the summit, being held at the trade fair grounds in downtown Hamburg, but they were quickly thwarted by police.
Further away in the city's Altona district, police said people set several parked cars alight and attacked a police station, though the situation quickly calmed down.
The G-20 comprises Argentina, Australia, Brazil, China, Germany, France, Britain, India, Indonesia, Italy, Japan, Canada, South Korea, Mexico, Russia, Saudi Arabia, South Africa, Turkey, the United States and the European Union.
Also attending the summit are the Netherlands, Norway, Spain, Guinea, Senegal, Singapore and Vietnam.
