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Trump Portrays G-7 as a Lovefest, Papering Over Differences
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By Associated Press
Published 6 years ago on
August 27, 2019

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BIARRITZ, France โ€” Never mind his differences with world leaders on China, trade, Russia, Iran and more. President Donald Trumpโ€™s takeaway message from the Group of Seven summit in France was โ€œunity.โ€ In fact, โ€œflawlessโ€ unity.
During this yearโ€™s gathering of leaders of the worldโ€™s wealthiest democracies, Trump went to great lengths to portray it as something of a lovefest, papering over significant disagreements on major issues.
โ€œIf there was any word for this particular meeting of seven very important countries, it was unity,โ€ Trump said at a news conference Monday closing out the two-day gathering in the French resort of Biarritz.
โ€œWe got along great,โ€ he said. โ€œWe got along great.โ€
He continued that message Tuesday after returning home from France. โ€œThe G-7 was a great success for the USA and all,โ€ he wrote in a tweet. โ€œLameStream Media coverage bore NO relationship to what actually happened in France โ€“ FAKE NEWS. It was GREAT!โ€


After Trump disrupted the last two G-7 summits with his erratic behavior, other world leaders seemed determined to play along this year in the interest of keeping any negative drama out of the headlines.
First came the decision by French President Emmanuel Macron, the summit host, to scrap the annual practice of issuing a lengthy joint statement, or communique, at the summitโ€™s conclusion.

Statement Plays Down Disagreements

The document typically spells out the consensus that leaders have reached on issues on the summit agenda and provides a roadmap for how they plan to tackle them.

French President Emmanuel Macron stressed that everyone had worked โ€œtogether, hand in hand, with President Trump over these two days.โ€
Trump roiled the 2017 meeting in Italy over the climate change passage in that summitโ€™s final statement. And he withdrew his signature from the 2018 communique after complaining he had been slighted by Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau, the host that year.
โ€œI think itโ€™s against that background that Macron decided itโ€™s not worth itโ€ to issue a statement, said Thomas Bernes, a distinguished fellow at the Center for International Governance Innovation in Canada.
Instead, the leaders issued a final โ€œdeclarationโ€ that began, โ€œThe G7 leaders wish to emphasize their great unity and the positive spirit of their debates.โ€
Macron also sought to play down awkward differences and said that what the G-7 leaders were โ€œreally keen on was to convey a positive and joint message following our discussions.โ€
The French leader stressed that everyone had worked โ€œtogether, hand in hand, with President Trump over these two days.โ€
For all of the happy talk, though, Trump came under pressure to end his lengthy trade dispute with China that is hurting other nations as well.
Macron said the dispute had served to โ€œcreate uncertaintyโ€ that is โ€œbad for the world economy.โ€
Differences over Russia didnโ€™t stay hidden, either.
Photo of President Donald Trump and Egyptian President Abdel Fattah al-Sisi
President Donald Trump and Egyptian President Abdel Fattah al-Sisi participate in a bilateral meeting at the G-7 summit in Biarritz, France, Monday, Aug. 26, 2019. (AP Photo/Andrew Harnik)

Trump Accepting of North Korea Missile Tests

Trump, as he had before last yearโ€™s summit, said he would like to see Russia re-admitted to the club. The former G-8 kicked Russia out after President Vladimir Putin annexed the Crimean Peninsula in 2014.

โ€œRussia has yet to change the behavior that led to its expulsion in 2014, and therefore should not be allowed back into the G-7.โ€ โ€” Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau
While his affinity for Russia has been questioned at home, Trump said Monday heโ€™d prefer Russia be โ€œinside the tentโ€ rather than outside since so many of the issues the leaders discussed involved Russia.
Other members of the Group of Seven besides France, Canada, Italy and the U.S. are Britain, Germany and Japan.
Canadaโ€™s Trudeau told reporters he had privately aired his objection to Russian readmittance.
โ€œRussia has yet to change the behavior that led to its expulsion in 2014, and therefore should not be allowed back into the G-7,โ€ he said at a news conference.
For all the courting of Trump by Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe, Trump wouldnโ€™t adopt Abeโ€™s position that short-range ballistic missile tests by neighboring North Korea violate U.N. resolutions.
Trump insisted that he and Abe were on the โ€œsame pageโ€ โ€” but he appeared to defend the missile tests by North Koreaโ€™s Kim Jong Un by saying a lot of other people were testing missiles, too.
โ€œWeโ€™re in the world of missiles, folks, whether you like it or not,โ€ he said.

Macron Addresses Summit Challenges

Trump also claimed that โ€œgreat unityโ€ existed on Iran, but he largely just restated his long-held views about the country, some of them hardly shared.
France, Germany and other G-7 members are unhappy that Trump withdrew the U.S. from a 2015 international pact that eased sanctions on Iran in exchange for the Iranians agreeing to limit their nuclear program.
Trump said the biggest conclusion the leaders reached was that Iran โ€œcanโ€™t have nuclear weapons.โ€ Far from a breakthrough, that has been the worldโ€™s position for decades.
Asked about his efforts to ensure that fighters for the Islamic State group be returned to their home countries across Europe rather than housed by the United States, Trump said during a meeting with German Chancellor Angela Merkel that the G-7 leaders had โ€œa pretty good meeting.โ€ But then he allowed that they had โ€œnot reached a total conclusion.โ€
โ€œItโ€™s unfair for the United States to take them, because they didnโ€™t come from the United States,โ€ he complained.
Macron flicked at the challenges of smoothing over differences by reaching back in history.
Seeking to justify the role of mediator between Iran and the United States that Macron is carving out, the French leader quoted one of his predecessors, World War II hero Gen. Charles de Gaulle, who said, โ€œDiplomacy is trying to hold together broken windows.โ€

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