The world’s 20 most powerful economies pledged Sunday to lead a global battle against the coronavirus health and economic crisis — even as their own virtual gathering revealed the risks of national competition for the quickest access to vaccines and other therapeutics.
But in initial interventions on Saturday, some leaders, including Russian President Vladimir Putin, Chinese President Xi Jinping,and U.K. Prime Minister Boris Johnson, stressed the success of vaccine development in their own countries, which to some listeners suggested a clear sense of global competition among the richest and most powerful countries in the race to counter the pandemic.
He added there was"very clear recognition from the G20 leaders that if we leave any country behind, we will be behind. So we cannot resolve this issue in certain parts of the world because the rest of the world will suffer. If one country suffers, we will all suffer." In their communique, the leaders reiterated their annual commitment to supporting international trade and restated their resolve to fight climate change. For the first time since Trump took office in 2017, the U.S. did not quibble over the climate language — a move that was interpreted as reflecting Washington's closeness to Riyadh and the fact that technically the U.S. has quit the Paris climate accords, rather than any shift in policy.
At the conclusion of the summit, Saudi Arabia handed off the G20 presidency to Italy, which next year plans to organize a global health summit.
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