The Group of 20 major economies cannot effectively function as long as Russia remains a member, Canada's finance minister said on Friday after a week of protests of Moscow's war in Ukraine at the International Monetary Fund and World Bank meetings in Washington.

Discord over Russia's presence at the meetings has been on display all week, with officials from the U.S., Canada, Britain and other Western countries staging walkouts three days in a row whenever Russian officials spoke.

The G20 finance ministers and central bank governors, who met in Washington on Wednesday, failed to agree on its traditional communique outlining economic policy goals as Russia blocked strong language condemning its invasion of Ukraine.

The IMF steering committee and the World Bank-IMF Development Committee also failed to issue joint statements.

"The G20 can't function effectively with Russia at the table," Chrystia Freeland, Canadian minister of finance, told a news conference with Ukrainian Finance Minister Serhiy Marchenko in Washington.

"Russia does not have a place at the table of countries who have come together to maintain global economic prosperity," Freeland said, adding Russia has violated longstanding international rules with its invasion of southern Ukraine. "You can't be a poacher and gamekeeper at the same time."

The tensions have called into question the effectiveness of the G20, which includes Western countries that have accused Moscow of war crimes in Ukraine, as well as China, India, Indonesia and South Africa, which have not joined Western-led sanctions against Russia over the conflict.

'GRASSROOTS' PROGRESS

This year's G20 host country Indonesia is still optimistic that progress can be made on a number of issues despite the tensions, Indonesian Finance Minister Sri Mulyani Indrawati told Reuters in an interview.

"Even with a walk out, we all agree" on the substance of work that needs to be done, Indrawati said.

Indrawati said she is more focused on "grassroots" technical work underlying issues such as strengthening a G20 common debt framework for poor countries, and creating a new financing mechanism for future pandemic needs, than issuing a communique at the present stage.

With other G20 finance meetings scheduled for July and October and a leaders summit in November, Indrawati said there was ample time to continue progress.

"If there is no forum at all, then the world is going to be in a much worse place," with each country setting policy without regard for others.

Freeland, who is of Ukrainian descent, has made impassioned pleas on behalf of Ukraine since Russia invaded the country in late February.

On Thursday she directly addressed Russian Finance Minister Anton Siluanov, who joined an IMF meeting virtually, saying his participation was "perverse and absurd" since "your war is making us poorer," according to a source.

Russia calls its actions in Ukraine a "special operation."


https://www.reuters.com/world/canada-says-g20-cannot-function-with-russia-table-2022-04-22/

Yeah but it will be almost impossible to remove Russia from G20 because they need 100% of the votes to do so, as we all know, China will never vote against Russia, not now and not in the nearest future. How I wish the west and its allies can just leave the G20 for them so it becomes G2 or G4. Nonsense and ingredients

This war has been a HUGE mistake by Putin.
And the thing is, there is no way he can stop it and save face without taking over all of Ukraine - something everyone thought would be a cakewalk for Russia.
Even Finland and Sweden and all non-aligned countries near Russia are now clamoring to be accepted into NATO - the exact opposite of what Putin intended to achieve by this war!

Nice demotion. From G8 to G20 all because of one man's greed and intentions to dominate his neighbors.

Russia shouldn't be part of any global organisation

G20 was functioning when UK, USA and France invaded over 20 countries or supported regime change with weapons and guns but all of a sudden G20 can’t function between Russia also did what USA and her allies have been doing for years.

seunny4lif:
G20 was functioning when UK, USA and France invaded over 20 countries or supported regime change with weapons and guns but all of a sudden G20 can’t function between Russia also did what USA and her allies have been doing for years.

you dey mind those clowns

This double faced clowns. I love how Russia is calling their bluffs

Russia has really death with the West, Inspite of all the noisy sanctions their economy still stands strong while they continue to make so much money from selling gas to Europe and fertilizer to America