Brazil’s G20 summit produces a broad declaration that’s short on specifics

Associated Press

RIO DE JANEIRO (AP) — The summit of the Group of 20 leading economies in Rio de Janeiro produced a joint declaration Monday that, while not totally endorsed by one of the group’s members, succeeded in addressing most topics host Brazil had prioritized addressing: both ongoing major wars, a global pact to fight hunger, taxation of the world’s wealthiest people and changes to global governance.

Experts had doubted Brazil ‘s President Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva could convince assembled leaders to hammer out agreement given uncertainty about the incoming administration of U.S. President-elect Donald Trump and heightened global tensions amid the wars in Ukraine and the Middle East. Further dimming prospects of consensus, Argentina’s negotiators challenged some of the draft language — and ultimately refrained from endorsing the complete document.

“Although generic, it is a positive surprise for Brazil,” said Thomas Traumann, an independent political consultant and former Brazilian minister. “There was a moment when there was risk of no declaration at all. Despite the caveats, it is a good result for Lula.”

Condemnation of wars, calls for peace, but without casting blame

Militant group Hamas’ Oct. 7, 2023, attack on Israel occurred one month after last year’s G20 summit. It was thus unclear how this year’s statement might address Israel’s campaign of retaliation, which has killed more than 43,000 Palestinians in Gaza, according to local health officials, and more than 3,500 people in Lebanon in Israel’s offensive against Hezbollah, according to Lebanon’s Health Ministry.

The G20 declaration referred to the “catastrophic humanitarian situation in the Gaza and the escalation in Lebanon,” and stressed the urgent need to expand humanitarian assistance and reinforce protection of civilians.

“Affirming the Palestinian right to self-determination, we reiterate our unwavering commitment to the vision of the two-State solution where Israel and a Palestinian State live side by side in peace,” it said.

But it made no mention of Israel’s suffering or some 100 hostages that remain in Hamas captivity. Israel isn’t a G20 member.

That lack of acknowledgment appeared to run contrary to U.S. President Joe Biden’s consistent backing of Israel’s right to defend itself. It’s something Biden dutifully notes in public, even when speaking about the deprivation of Palestinians caused by the grinding war. During a meeting with G20 leaders before the declaration was hammered home, Biden expressed his view that Hamas is solely to blame for the war and called on fellow leaders to “increase the pressure on Hamas” to accept a cease-fire deal.

Looming large on Monday was news of Biden’s decision to ease restrictions on Ukraine’s use of longer-range U.S. missiles to allow that country to strike more deeply inside Russia.

“The United States strongly supports Ukraine’s sovereignty and territorial integrity. Everyone around this table in my view should, as well,” Biden said during the summit.

Russian President Vladimir Putin is the summit’s most notable absentee. The International Criminal Court has issued a warrant that obliges member states to arrest him, and Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov attended instead.

The G20 declaration highlighted the human suffering in Ukraine while calling for peace, but without naming Russia.

“The declaration avoids pointing the finger at the culprits,” said Paulo Velasco, an international relations professor at the State University of Rio de Janeiro. “That is, it doesn’t make any critical mention of Israel or Russia, but it highlights the dramatic humanitarian situations in both cases.”

Such lack of specificity is true of the entire declaration, Velasco added. “It is very much in line with what Brazil hoped for … but if we really analyze it carefully, it is very much a declaration of intent. It is a declaration of good will on various issues, but we have very few concrete, tangible measures.”

Fraught push to demand taxation of global billionaires

In working group meetings in the run-up to the G20, ministers and negotiators discussed Brazil’s proposal to tax billionaires’ incomes by 2%. According to French economist Gabriel Zucman, who worked as a consultant for Lula’s administration on the topic, such a measure would affect some 3,000 people around the world, of whom 100 are in Latin América.

At the start of the leaders’ afternoon session, Lula reiterated his call for the tax.

That made it into the final declaration, but there had been considerable doubt it would. One official from Brazil and one from another G20 nation say Argentine negotiators most vehemently opposed the clause — which they had previously accepted, in July — and another promoting gender equality. They spoke on condition of anonymity because they weren’t authorized to speak publicly.

In the end, Argentina signed the G20 declaration while partially dissenting from certain aspects, it said in a statement on X. That included content related to the U.N.’s previous 2030 sustainable development agenda that right-wing President Javier Milei has referred to as “a supranational program of a socialist nature.” It also objected to the regulation of hate speech on social media, action by global institutions like the U.N. that the libertarian president has criticized as infringement on national sovereignty, and the idea that increased state intervention is the way to fight hunger.

Argentina’s presidency didn’t respond to requests for comment clarifying specifically which clauses it opposed. The official from the G20 nation with knowledge of the negotiations said Argentina adopted the statement under intense pressure from world powers. The X statement, the official said, was aimed at a domestic audience that appeared to relish Milei’s Trump-like role as spoiler in the multilateral talks hosted by his outspoken critic, Lula.

Concrete step for fighting global hunger

Much of the declaration focuses on the eradication of hunger — a priority for Lula.

Brazil’s government previously stressed that Lula’s launch of the global alliance against hunger and poverty on Monday was as important as the final declaration. As of Monday, 82 nations had signed onto the plan, Brazil’s government said. It is also backed by organizations including the Rockefeller Foundation and the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation.

A demonstration Sunday on Rio’s Copacabana beach featured 733 empty plates spread across the sand to represent the 733 million people who went hungry in 2023, according to United Nations data, and called on leaders to take action.

Viviana Santiago, a director at Oxfam, an anti-poverty nonprofit, praised Brazil for using its G20 presidency “to respond to people’s demands worldwide to tackle extreme inequality, hunger and climate breakdown, and particularly for rallying action on taxing the super-rich.”

“Brazil has lit a path toward a more just and resilient world, challenging others to meet them at this critical juncture,” she said in a statement.

Long-awaited reform of United Nations

Leaders pledged to work for “transformative reform” of the U.N. Security Council so that it aligns “with the realities and demands of the 21st century, makes it more representative, inclusive, efficient, effective, democratic and accountable.”

Lula has been calling for reform of the powerful Security Council since his first two terms in power, from 2003-2010, but had gained little traction. Charged with maintaining international peace and security, it has not changed from its original 1945 configuration. Five countries that were dominant powers at the end of World War II have veto power — the U.S., Russia, China, Britain and France — while 10 countries from different regions serve two-year terms.

Virtually all countries agree that nearly eight decades after the United Nations was established, the Security Council should be expanded to reflect the world in the 21st century and include more voices. But the central quandary — and the biggest disagreement — remains how to do it. The G20 declaration doesn’t answer that question.

“We call for an enlarged Security Council composition that improves the representation of the underrepresented and unrepresented regions and groups, such as Africa, Asia-Pacific and Latin America and the Caribbean,” the declaration said.

The United States announced shortly before a U.N. summit in September that it supports two new permanent seats for African countries without veto power, and a first-ever non-permanent seat for a small island developing nation. But as examples, the Group of Four – Brazil, Germany, India and Japan – support each other’s bid for permanent seats. And the larger Uniting for Consensus group of a dozen countries including Pakistan, Italy, Turkey and Mexico wants additional non-permanent seats with longer terms.

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Associated Press writers Aamer Madhani in Rio de Janeiro, Edie Lederer at the United Nations and Isabel DeBre in La Paz, Bolivia contributed.