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Ihm it was boring again. As soon as host Saudi Arabia opened the virtual G-20 summit, the incumbent US president released several tweets. Trump’s topics weren’t the deliberations of the 20 largest industrial nations or their fight against the corona epidemic or associated recession. No, Trump tweeted again about an alleged electoral fraud in the United States, exactly two weeks after his loss to Joe Biden, the future president of the United States.
During the first hour of the videoconference with the heads of state and government, Trump complained of “massive and unprecedented electoral fraud.” Trump has been spreading conspiracy theories about the outcome of the Nov.3 presidential election, the winner of which he has declared, for more than two weeks. His election campaign, his personal lawyer Rudy Giuliani and the Republican Party have taken a series of legal actions, so far without any notable success.
Trump is following his announcement that he will only accept the election result in the event of a victory. The incumbent president rejects his successor, Biden, 78, who is in the transition phase (“transition”) common access to secure infrastructure, offices, employees and intelligence information. With a few exceptions, Republicans support this strategy of undermining American democracy. Only a handful of Republican senators have publicly congratulated Biden on his election victory.
At the start of the G-20 summit, 84-year-old King Salman of Saudi Arabia called for joint efforts by industrialized and emerging countries to deal with the crown pandemic. “We have a duty to meet the challenge together at this summit and send a strong message of hope,” Salman said Saturday. “Our peoples and our economies continue to suffer this impact. But we will do everything possible to weather this crisis through international cooperation ”. The decrepit monarch had great difficulty delivering his roughly ten-minute opening speech. He muttered about the prepared text. He had to start over several times.
Due to the Covid epidemic, the planned summit in Riyadh only took place virtually. In addition to Salman and Trump, the German Chancellor Angela Merkel, the President of Russia Vladimir Putin, the President of China, Xi Jinping, the President of the EU Commission, Ursula von der Leyen, and the Secretary General of the UN participated. António Guterres. Next to King Salman sat the Crown Prince of Saudi Arabia, Mohammed Bin Salman, the de facto ruler of Saudi Arabia.
Trump took the floor after the king’s keynote address. “His speech consisted of saying that he did an absolutely incredible job during his tenure, both economically and in the face of the pandemic,” a delegate who followed the non-public conversations told AFP. Consequently, Trump said “not a single word” on international affairs. With more than 255,700 deaths, the US has more Covid victims than any other country. More than 12 million Americans have been infected, and some 83,000 Covid patients are currently being treated in hospitals, 50 percent more than two weeks ago.
Trump was reportedly once again unclear about his political future at the summit. According to one attendee, Trump said: “It has been an honor working with you and I look forward to working with you in the future and for a long time.”
Trump’s real interest in the G-20 round with the most powerful figures in world politics (they represent two-thirds of the world’s population and more than 85 percent of world economic output) remained weak, as expected. He left the group early. Just as he often has a hard time withstanding events in which he is not the keynote speaker.
Trump is an opponent of multilateralism
In addition, the incumbent president was elected to the position in 2016 with the motto “America First.” He is an opponent of multilateralism, withdrew the United States from international alliances such as the World Health Organization (WHO) and the cultural organization of the UN Unesco. Trump had also occasionally flirted with a departure from NATO. Such a step can no longer be expected with Biden’s electoral victory.
The White House had scheduled Trump’s participation in the summit for 8 a.m. (local time) on Saturday. But his caravan left the government headquarters at 9.47 a.m. Meanwhile, Trump had changed, wearing a white cap and a red jacket. At 10:29 am, the incumbent president arrived at his golf club in Sterling, Virginia.
At the summit, Trump was temporarily represented by Treasury Secretary Steven Mnuchin and economic adviser Larry Kudlow. So, as the president of the United States skipped the summit, Russian President Vladimir Putin once again knew how to put himself in the spotlight. Putin, for example, offered the international community wide access to the “Sputnik-V” vaccine developed in Russia. It is not the first time that the Kremlin has made effective use of the power vacuum that Trump offers.
EU Commission President von der Leyen called for increased financial support for the global initiative to tackle the corona pandemic. It is about enabling corona tests, treatments and vaccines around the world. “We have to show global solidarity,” von der Leyen said.
Chancellor Merkel made a similar statement. “To contain the pandemic, vaccination must be available and affordable for all countries. The funds promised so far are not enough for this, ”Merkel said according to the manuscript of the speech. “So I ask everyone to support this important initiative.” The goal of the international campaign is to distribute two billion doses of vaccines by the end of 2021. “We have already raised almost five billion dollars for this initiative. Germany is contributing more than 500 million euros, ”said Merkel.
The United States begins the process of withdrawing from the Paris climate agreement
The United States is now taking the first step in a long process that should lead to the withdrawal of the agreement. The resignation will take effect no earlier than one day after the US presidential election on November 3, 2020.
On Sunday, the second and last day of the summit, Trump attacked the international agreement against global warming. The Paris climate treaty, from which the United States recently withdrew, is “very unfair and one-sided.” The goal of the Paris Agreement was “to kill the American economy,” Trump said in his video message posted Sunday. The president-elect of the United States, Biden, wants to rejoin the agreement.
Trump’s position is in direct contradiction to the attitude of all the other leading economic powers at the summit, which have signed the Paris Agreement and are campaigning for climate protection. In previous years, 19 members of the G 20 had already committed to the Paris climate protection agreement, while the United States under Trump did not want to sign this part of the final declaration.
“I just came to the virtual G20 meeting,” Trump tweeted on Sunday morning at 8:13 am (local time). The day before, he was there too (“early”), Trump said. Some of the “fake news“-The media did not report this correctly. “As usual,” complained the incumbent president.
According to a draft of the final declaration, the G-20 “will spare no effort” to ensure fair and affordable access to vaccines in the world. Trump at least supports this statement.
Trump also ended his participation in the Sunday morning summit. At 11:16 a.m., the president’s caravan left the White House grounds. Target again: Trump’s golf club in Virginia.
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