- Germany has rejected President Trump’s suggestion that Russia should be readmitted to the “Group of Seven” meeting of major economies.
- Russia was ousted in 2014 after President Vladimir Putin annexed the Crimea and backed a rebellion in eastern Ukraine.
- Heiko Maas, Germany’s foreign secretary, said there was no possibility of readmitting Russia until it resolved the situation in eastern Ukraine and Crimea.
- “As long as we don’t have a solution there, I don’t see any possibility for this,” he said.
- Trump told Fox News in June: “It is not a question of what he has done. It is a matter of common sense.”
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Germany has rejected President Trump’s proposal that Russia be readmitted to the “Group of Seven” meeting of major economies.
Russia had been a member of the intergovernmental group, comprising Canada, France, Germany, Italy, Japan, the United Kingdom, and the United States, as the eighth member until his expulsion in 2014 after Putin annexed the Crimea and backed a rebellion in eastern Ukraine.
Heiko Maas, Germany’s foreign secretary, said there was no possibility of readmitting Russia until it resolved the situation in eastern Ukraine and Crimea.
“The reason for Russia’s exclusion was the annexation of Crimea and the intervention in eastern Ukraine,” he told the Rheinische Post newspaper in German in comments reported by Reuters. “As long as we don’t have a solution there, I don’t see any possibility for this.”
Trump said in June that it was “common sense” for Russian President Vladimir Putin to be invited to the G7.
“It is not a question of what he has done. It is a matter of common sense,” the president told Fox News on June 3.
“The problem is that a lot of the things we talk about are about Putin, so we’re sitting there wasting time because then you have to end your meeting and someone has to call Putin or deal with Putin on different things. And I say have it in the room, “he said.
Maas admitted that Russia remains an important part of the G7 summits.
“We also know that we need Russia to resolve conflicts in Syria, Libya and Ukraine,” he said.
But he said there was no need to add Russia to the G7 format, given that Russia remains part of the G20, a larger group of leading economies.
“The G7 and G20 are two sensibly coordinated formats,” he said.
“We don’t need G11 or G12.”
