The Davos summit of global political and business elites returns Monday after a COVID-induced two-year break to face another momentous crisis: Russia's invasion of Ukraine.The theme of the World Economic Forum (WEF), "History at a Turning Point", sets the tone for the four-day meeting in the glitzy Swiss mountain resort that will be dominated by the political and economic fallout from the conflict.When the WEF last took place in Davos in January 2020, the coronavirus was just b

The United States (US) is preparing a scaled-back version of a trade pact as Southeast Asian nations gather in Washington, where President Joe Biden is seeking to show solid commitment in the face of a rising China.Leaders from the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN) will meet Biden for dinner Thursday at the start of a two-day summit, part of a renewed US focus on Asia after months of intense effort on Ukraine.Before Russia's invasion of Ukraine, the Biden administration had

Leaders of the world's most advanced nations met Saturday at the G20 summit in Rome hoping to hammer out a way forward on climate change and vaccine equality, with consensus still outstanding on the most pressing global issues. In their first in-person gathering since the start of the COVID-19 pandemic, the relaunch of the global economy will also be front and centre on the two-day agenda, while the bloc is likely to approve a minimum tax rate for the biggest multinationals.But

Myanmar's junta chief will be excluded from an upcoming Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN) summit, the group said Saturday, a rare rebuke as concerns rise over the military government's commitment to defusing a bloody crisis.Foreign ministers from ASEAN agreed at an emergency meeting late Friday that a "non-political representative" for Myanmar would be invited to the 26-28 October summit, current ASEAN chair Brunei said in a statement.The decision effectively

Southeast Asian nations are discussing whether to exclude Myanmar's junta chief from a summit due to slow progress on a plan to address turmoil after a coup in the country earlier this year, a top diplomat said Wednesday.The Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN) has been under pressure to address unrest in the aftermath of the military power grab in February and a subsequent crackdown on dissent.But members of the 10-nation bloc have voiced disappointment over the Myanmar junta&

President Joe Biden and the leaders of Australia, India and Japan promised Friday to work together for a stable, open and democratic Indo-Pacific in a veiled dig at China during their first in-person summit together.In Biden's latest effort to cement United States (US) leadership in the face of a rising China, the so-called Quad agreed to move ahead on a joint plan to provide COVID-19 vaccines around Asia, launched a new climate initiative and said the four nations would begin holding an

In a recent essay on Samantha Power, President Joe Biden’s new administrator of the United States (US) Agency for International Development, Michelle Goldberg of The New York Times writes – correctly – that Power’s “first big test … lies in what America does to help vaccinate the rest of the world against COVID-19.” And Power herself is quoted as saying that, “It’s about a very, very tangible, results-oriented agenda.” Results seemed to follow.

The 2021 G7 summit took place in the United Kingdom (UK) at Carbis Bay in Cornwall. Since the 1970s, the G7 has met each year. The G7 is an informal bloc of industrialised democracies consisting of the United States (US), Canada, France, Germany, Italy, Japan, and the United Kingdom (UK). The group meets annually to discuss global economic issues, health emergencies, international security, energy policy, climate crisis, and the like.

G7 leaders on Sunday vowed to start delivering one billion doses of COVID vaccines and to step up action on climate change, in a United States (US)-led summit call to arms that also took on China and Russia.In a final communique issued at their first physical summit in nearly two years, the leaders of the elite club largely hewed to US President Joe Biden's push to regain the West's cohesion after Donald Trump's tumultuous tenure."We will harness the power of democracy, fr

The United States (US) and China clashed in rare talks Friday as President Joe Biden made his international debut at the G7 summit, with his administration pressing Beijing on COVID, Taiwan and human rights.Secretary of State Antony Blinken, joining Biden at the summit of industrial democracies in England, spoke by telephone with senior Chinese official Yang Jiechi – their first talks since a heated in-person encounter in Alaska in March.As Biden used his first presidential trip abroad to unv