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LONDON (BBC News) – US Vice-President Joe Biden has called for G20 protesters to give governments a chance to tackle the economic crisis.
At a G20 warm-up meeting in Chile, Mr Biden said heads of state would agree proposals to remedy the crisis at next week’s meeting in London. He was joined by UK Prime Minister Gordon Brown, host of Thursday’s summit, who echoed Mr Biden’s comments.
At a news conference in Vina del Mar, Mr Biden said: “I would hope the protesters give us a chance, listen to what we have to say and hopefully we can make it clear to them that we’re going to walk away from this G20 meeting with some concrete proposals.”
Tens of thousands of protesters marched in the UK capital and in Germany, France and Italy.
Banner in London march: "Capitalism isn't working."
(Times Online) – Gordon Brown’s carefully laid plans for a G20 deal on worldwide tax cuts have been scuppered by an eve-of-summit ambush by European leaders.
Angela Merkel, the German chancellor, last night led the assault on the prime minister’s “global new deal” for a $2 trillion-plus fiscal stimulus to end the recession.
“I will not let anyone tell me that we must spend more money,” she said.
The Spanish finance minister, Pedro Solbes, also dismissed new cash being pledged at Thursday’s London summit.
“In these conditions I and the rest of my colleagues from the eurozone believe there is no room for new fiscal stimulus plans,” he said.
Nicolas Sarkozy, the French president, has insisted that “radical reform” of capitalism is more important than tax cutting.
WASHINGTON (AFP) – US President Barack Obama stepped into the battle to combat global warming unveiling an international forum of 17 major economies to speed up work towards a key UN accord.
Dubbed the Major Economics Forum on Energy and Climate, Obama invited 16 other nations to join the United States at talks to be hosted in Washington at the end of April.
The April 27-28 preparatory talks will be followed by a summit of the 17 leaders to be held in Italy in July, aiming to help hammer out a new agreement to curb greenhouse gases to replace the Kyoto Protocol when it expires in 2012.
“The Major Economies Forum will facilitate a candid dialogue among key developed and developing countries, help generate the political leadership necessary to achieve a successful outcome at the UN climate change negotiations,” the White House said in a statement.
Obama hopes the new forum will aid talks in Copenhagen in December aimed at producing a new UN accord.
And he aims to “advance the exploration of concrete initiatives and joint ventures that increase the supply of clean energy while cutting greenhouse gas emissions,” the White House statement said.
The major economies include: Australia, Brazil, Britain, Canada, China, the European Union, France, Germany, India, Indonesia, Italy, Japan, Korea, Mexico, Russia, South Africa and the United States.
"But I will not let myself be reduced to silence."