What do we expect from the 46th G7 summit?

* This is the first article in a set of articles published successively under "Files on the G7 Table."

 Introduction

The "scheduled" date for the 46th G7 Summit in the US is approaching, coincided with acute divisions and disagreements that dominate such economic forum - which constitutes about 50% of the global economy - and prevent it from effectively responding to the internal challenges facing its member states, let alone the political issues. The small-scale membership of the Forum, consisting of the US, UK, France, Italy, Canada, Japan, and Germany, no longer enjoys harmony and concord, especially in light of the several restrictions facing these countries and hindering them from taking jointed decisions regarding pressing issues.

Between 1998 and 2004, the forum was known as the "Group of Eight", until Russia's membership was suspended following its annexation of Crimea in 2014. This event has reinforced the notion that the G7 were a pure group that includes only greatest democracies in the world. However, such perception is no longer valid; for during the past few years, major disagreements on important issues have emerged, such as dealing with Russia, climate change, trade, and immigration, especially since the US President, Donald Trump, began participating in the group's meetings when the summit was held in the Italian city of Sicily in 2017, the matter which raised many questions about ways of cooperation between these countries in different policies.

How deep is the discord?

The significance of the divisions among the G7 states can be revealed by tracing some of their concluding statements. At the Summit held in Sicily in 2017, the final statement was barely 6 pages, which is very few compared to the 32-page statement of the summit held in Japan in 2016. At the next summit held in the Canadian city of Quebec in 2018, US President, Donald Trump, left early for Singapore to meet North Korean leader Kim Jong Un, shaking the other six states with his refusal to sign the joint statement using the social media website, Twitter, while indicating that he had ordered US officials not to support the statement, in a first-time action for the past 40 years and described by the German magazine Der Spiegel at that time as an “unprecedented scandal."

To avoid such a "scandal", the French President, Emmanuel Macron, decided that the summit, which was set to be held in France in 2019, would be concluded without a joint communique. Hence, it was meant to be the first time since meetings began in 1975 that the forum ever gave in a final statement, thus laying bare the deepening rift between seven states of the world’s largest economies.

In fact, the existence of several deep discords between the G-7 states has prevented reaching an agreement - at least diplomatically - about drafting the final statements of the summits since the aforementioned summit held in Quebec. The most important of these disagreement are the change in US foreign policy since Donald Trump took office, in addition to the large cracks in the European body, especially with the Brexit and the rise of nationalist parties in Europe. All these and other factors impede the G-7's ability to agree on multiple global issues, most notably; the stand towards China and Russia, trade, and the climate.

Hence, these issues, in addition to many current global issues, lead us to imagine that the G7 this year will be more polarized and intense, specially that the most prominent of these contentious issues are the Sino-American rivalry, the coronavirus pandemic, the economic crisis in the "post-coronavirus stage”, trade issues, and the ever-present Iranian nuclear file coinciding with a dangerous US-Iranian escalation in the Arab Gulf and Iraq. Also the most important of all is that the summit will be held simultaneously with the holding of the US elections, suggesting that the US President, Donald Trump, will be more rigid in his stands, especially those related to his electoral promises.

What to expect from the 46th G7 Summit?

So far, the summit's agenda has not been announced, yet it can be easily anticipated. Earlier, some US officials accused the French President, Emmanuel Macron, of ignoring issues of concern to Washington and of focusing the agenda on general issues such as climate change, gender equality, and women's rights. It seems that such issues will be excluded at the next summit as they are not matters of interest to the US President, Donald Trump.

The issue of climate change was strongly present in the previous G-7 summits that were held in Italy, Canada, and France. But with regard to the stands of the US President, Donald Trump, towards this issue, it is evident that climate change will not be on the agenda of the next summit that will be held in the United States in 2020, taking into consideration that Trump has withdrawn from The Paris Climate Agreement in 2017, shortly after his first attendance at the G7 summit in Italy, when he expressed his rejection to the climate agreement. As for the summit in Canada, he withdrew early before talks on climate change and refused to sign the final statement. At the France summit as well, climate issues were not included in the leaders' declaration following the summit.

Politically speaking, previous summits made it clear that US President Donald Trump had replaced the Russian threat with the Chinese. At the summit held in the Canadian city of Quebec in 2018, he called for returning Russia to the group, saying: "I would like to see Russia rejoining the group, as it used to be G8 not G7." However, none of the G-7 states leaders agrees with him except for the Italian Prime Minister, Giuseppe Conte. Yet, this was not enough for Trump’s calls to be met; since membership decisions are subject to the approval of all states in the group. Nevertheless, as the chairman of the G7 Summit 2020, it is the right time for Trump to select external guests, since the president of the group is theoretically entitled to invite the Russian President, Vladimir Putin, to attend as an "observer." Doing so would increase tensions between states of the group anyway.

In addition to Russia, Trump intends to expand the list of invitees to include Australia, South Korea, and India, at a time when he said: " I don’t feel that as a G7 it properly represents what’s going on in the world,” adding “[it is] a very outdated group of countries," as reported by France 24 news agency in May 2020.  It is fairly obvious here that the agenda of the G-7 Summit in 2020 is going to witness intensive efforts by the US President to restrain China; for the three invited countries, with the exception of Russia, were referred to in the US National Security Strategy for 2017 as allies of the US in face of China.

If that is the case, European states would find themselves "alienated" within the G7. Earlier, Politico magazine quoted, in August 2019, a Trump administration official that the Group of Seven had proven unable to deal with actors on the ground, like China, as there is a disagreement between Europe and the US over the way of dealing with China. At the summit held in France 2019, most of the group's leaders announced their intention to ask US President Donald Trump to mitigate the trade war on China. However, Trump announced the imposition of additional duties on Chinese imports one day before his arrival at the summit in France. Thus, Trump may find in the new invitees an alternative to Europe for the formation of a united front against China.

When discussing about China, one cannot separate it from the coronavirus crisis, or as US President Donald Trump previously called it "the Chinese virus." He attacked both China and the World Health Organization, and announced the suspension of US funding for the organization, an action that was condemned by many G7 states including UK, Germany, and Canada, in addition to the European Union.

The 2020 summit is also likely to shed light on the European-American disagreements over Iran. At the summit held in France 2019, The leaders’ declaration referred to Iran only vaguely, and it reflected the broad demands and aspirations of the seven states. It stipulated ensuring that Iran does not possess nuclear weapons, and the need to promote peace and stability in the region, without addressing contentious issues among the leaders of the group, such as those related to US sanctions, the US withdrawal from the nuclear agreement, and the Iranian escalation in the Gulf, in addition to the absence of any clear and effective joint steps to unify the stand towards Iran.

It is not expected that the 2020 summit will focus on meeting the demands of European countries that have appealed to the United States not to punish European companies which do business in Iran, specially that the two countries are heading towards escalation in the Middle East. This came in the aftermath of the storming of the US embassy in Baghdad in December 2019 by pro-Iranian groups, and the ensuing killing of the former commander of the Quds Force, General Qassem Soleimani, in early 2020, not to mention that the US President, Donald Trump, will not take any steps that might violate his electoral promises during such time.

Finally, this summit is to be held amid trade disputes among the United States, European countries and Canada, and it is unlikely to witness a change in the stand of the US President, Donald Trump. For even under the brunt of the coronavirus crisis and the total and partial closure policies that resulted, bringing about fears of a global recession, Trump did not stop his trade war against the European Union. In February 2020, the US announced that it would raise customs duties on Airbus aircraft imported from Europe from 10% to 15%, driving European Union to announce measures to be taken against the American company, Boeing, in response. This appears to be similar to the past trade war between the two sides. After the summit held in Quebec City in 2018, US President, Donald Trump, announced the imposition of tariffs on steel and aluminum exports on all G7 member states, provoking the European Union to add tariffs on US goods worth more than 3 billion dollars.

Conclusion

Depending on the changes in the US foreign policy, especially under the presidency of Donald Trump, the G7 summit 2020 is not expected to witness a smooth and positive change differently from previous summits. This is not limited to the G7, but it is also applicable to the organizations and coalitions that bring these countries together, such as NATO and the European Union, have recently suffered from deep disputes among their members. These three organizations consistently fail to address global and national challenges alike.

The coincidence of the summit with the US elections make the scene further complicated. Trump is likely to present himself in a way that reflects his firm stand towards China, Iran, and the trade with the G7 member states. Since they all are previous electoral promises, it is unlikely that he will bet on losing them in his current election campaign. 

The status of the G7 can be summed up by quoting the President of the European Council, Donald Tusk, at the G7 summit held in 2019: " There is still no certainty whether the group will be able to find common solutions."