The G-7 creates a platform to coordinate financial assistance for the reconstruction of Ukraine | International

The reconstruction plan for Ukraine is advancing hand in hand with the G-7, which on Monday agreed to create a platform from which to coordinate all the financial aid that is being collected. This mechanism, decided in a previous meeting of the group of the seven most industrialized powers -Germany, the United States, Canada, Japan, the United Kingdom, France and Italy-, will be formed by Ukraine, the main international financial institutions and the countries that contribute aid economic. The German Chancellor, Olaf Scholz, assured that the platform will be launched “as soon as possible” to channel the economic efforts of all global actors in “a task for humanity that is perhaps comparable to the Marshall Plan after World War II ”, he highlighted during an appearance in Berlin.

The heads of state and government of the G-7 met virtually for the sixth time under the German presidency, which is already preparing to take over from Japan starting on January 1. “This number alone shows how closely we have coordinated with our partners this year,” Scholz said. The meeting, to which the Ukrainian president, Volodimir Zelensky, was also invited, is the last of the German presidency, marked “by Russia’s brutal aggression against Ukraine,” Scholz stressed. The seven partners are united in their determination to “maintain support for kyiv as long as it takes” at all levels, economic, humanitarian and military, he added.

Zelensky reiterated his request to the G-7 leaders to receive more “modern tanks,” the president said on his Telegram account. “We need more artillery and longer-range missiles. The more effective we are with these weapons, the shorter the Russian invasion will be,” he added. He also asked for their help in maintaining the country’s financial, energy and social stability next year.

The German chancellor stressed that the cap on the price of oil recently introduced by the G-7 (and the EU) is intended to further reduce Moscow’s income from exports of this hydrocarbon and increase pressure on Russian President Vladimir Putin. He said of him that his “international isolation” is evident and asked him again, on behalf of the group, to “stop the senseless killings in Ukraine” and to “withdraw his troops.”

Foundation of the “climate club”

By way of closing the year of the German presidency, Scholz highlighted the creation of the “climate club”, proposed by Berlin at the face-to-face summit held in summer at the Elmau castle in Bavaria. This initiative aims to add to the efforts against the climate crisis in countries around the world. The G-7, said the foreign minister, does not lose sight of other global tasks despite the Russian war of aggression and its consequences. The club will be “open and cooperative” and all capitals are invited to participate. The G-7 leaders took advantage of their last meeting of the year to agree on a statute and put it into operation. According to Scholz, many countries expressed their interest in joining the so-called Club 2023 during the climate conference held last month in Sharm El Sheikh (Egypt).

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The club will have an interim secretariat, which will be in charge of the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD) and the International Energy Agency (IEA). “In Elmau we laid the foundations of this club and now, at the farewell to our year in office, we have achieved broad support for our initiative,” announced the chancellor.

Although the issue of the supply of arms and ammunition to Ukraine was not discussed at the meeting, as Scholz’s spokesman had announced at a press conference, the virtual meeting focused on the situation in the country, which will celebrate its 10th months at war The appointment also served to prepare the international conference that will take place this Tuesday in Paris to coordinate the most immediate aid, which is needed now to be able to face the winter and the massive attacks by Russia on critical infrastructures in Ukraine. The bombings are leaving millions of people without electricity in sub-zero temperatures.

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