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Trump’s China trap

Balance of Power
Bloomberg

Donald Trump is talking about adding a mix of interesting players to the guest list of the Group of Seven summit he's due to host this fall, including India, Australia, South Korea and Russia.

There's one conspicuous omission, though: China. That has European leaders on high alert.

They suspect the U.S. president wants to use the meeting to ramp up pressure on Beijing, and it has set off alarm bells among European diplomats, John Follain, Ania Nussbaum and Arne Delfs report.

One described it as a trap. Another said it was an electoral ploy before the U.S. vote in November. In any case, European envoys are determined not to let their bosses become props in a Trump show.

A range of diplomatic maneuvers have been deployed to wriggle free – they're stalling, they're bringing out the rulebook and they're trying to pin Trump down to a fixed agenda.

But the White House has made it clear he wants to focus the meeting on the future of China.

That's a treacherous subject for the Europeans, who'd rather emphasize Covid-19 and climate change and keep up a sense of multilateral order. That includes talking to China rather than antagonizing it.

All of that raises the possibility of a no-show. In normal circumstances, skipping a G-7 would be unthinkable for the Europeans. But the coronavirus offers a tempting excuse.

Ben Sills

In simpler times. German Chancellor Angela Merkel, Trump, Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau and French President Emmanuel Macron at the G-7 Summit in 2018 in Canada. 

Photographer: Leon Neal/Getty Images North America

Click here for Bloomberg's most compelling political images from the past week and tell us how we're doing or what we're missing at balancepower@bloomberg.net.

Global Headlines

Florida strategy | Trump's coronation as the Republican candidate for the November election will be held in August in Florida, a state vital to his strategy to defeat Democratic rival Joe Biden. Key parts of the Republican National Convention are being shifted from North Carolina because its state governor refused Trump's requests to lift all social-distancing measures. Florida has seen a surge in virus cases over the past week.

  • Kamala Harris is on strong footing in Biden's search for a running mate as he faces intensifying pressure to choose a black woman amid a national debate over race after the killing of George Floyd.

Macron maneuver | A newspaper report that President Emmanuel Macron may resign to trigger an early election provoked a vehement denial from his office and ignited a storm in the French media. But there may be some logic to it: Macron is in a tight spot after France stumbled in containing its Covid-19 outbreak and lockdown measures hammered the economy. A new mandate might be just what he needs.

Tiring of Trump | North Korea marked the two-year anniversary of the historic summit between leader Kim Jong Un and Trump by saying the meeting produced only empty promises and it may be better off not engaging with the U.S. Pyongyang accused Washington of turning dreams of peace into "a dark nightmare" and said it was bolstering its weapons arsenal as a result, Jeong-ho Lee reports.

Democratic shield | Brazil's congress, the judiciary and protesters are increasingly playing the role of defending democracy against President Jair Bolsonaro's authoritarian tendencies, according to Gilmar Mendes, one of the longest-serving justices in the Supreme Federal Court. He cited the rejection of Bolsonaro-supported bills to ease gun restrictions and a judicial ruling siding with state governors in imposing restrictions to fight the pandemic, Simone Iglesias and Walter Brandimarte report.

People take part in an anti-racism demonstration in Rio de Janeiro on June 7.

Photographer: Carl de Souza/AFP

Oil assault | The cruise missiles that slammed into a Saudi oil complex last year likely came from Iran, the United Nations concluded in a confidential report. The findings back U.S. allegations that the Tehran government was behind the attack, which sent tremors through global energy markets and shook the kingdom. The report comes as the Trump administration seeks to renew a UN arms embargo on Iran that's set to expire this year.

What to Watch

  • The U.K. will introduce a temporary light-touch customs regime at its border with the European Union next year to avoid piling burdens on businesses already struggling with the impact of coronavirus.
  • Houston-area officials are "getting close" to reimposing stay-at-home orders and are prepared to reopen a never-used Covid-19 hospital at a football stadium after infections in Texas soar.
  • Singapore is on track to lift more restrictions on companies and residents by the end of the month, and expects almost the entire economy to reopen in that phase.

Pop quiz, readers (no cheating!). Which country is lifting all social distancing restrictions after reporting zero active cases of Covid-19, indicating it has eliminated the virus? Send your answers to balancepower@bloomberg.net.

And finally ... After angering Trump by labeling one of his tweets for "glorifying violence" last month, Twitter is cracking down on a new list of users that might make powerful enemies. The social media company said it removed more than 32,000 accounts from Russia, China and Turkey for violating its policy against manipulating its service, describing them variously as spreading "deceptive" narratives and "state-backed political propaganda."

Twitter Chief Executive Officer Jack Dorsey has taken a stronger stance on policing content than its much larger rival Facebook.

Photographer: Cole Burston/Bloomberg

 

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