G7 leaders huddle in Italy, escaping political peril at home
CNN
When the Group of 7 pose for its ritual family photo Thursday on the rocky Adriatic coast of Italy, the image will not be of leaders at the height of their political strength.
When the Group of 7 pose for its ritual family photo Thursday on the rocky Adriatic coast of Italy, the image will not be of leaders at the height of their political strength. Instead, nearly to a person, the leaders assembling at a luxury resort in Puglia find themselves weakened at home by elections, scandal or waning influence. Amid the olive trees and swimming pools, the anti-incumbent sentiments coursing through Western democracies are creating extraordinarily high stakes for global geopolitics. Rarely has the yearly gathering of the world’s leading economies been so overshadowed by the political vulnerabilities of nearly all its members. It raises questions of how effective the “steering committee of the free world,” as US President Joe Biden’s aides have labeled the G7, can actually be amid anger and discontent from their own populations. Coming less than a week after far-right parties dominated in European Parliamentary elections and ahead of critical votes in France, the United Kingdom and the United States, the G7 summit will occur amid nagging anxiety about a populist resurgence. At a state dinner held in Biden’s honor at the Élysée Palace in Paris last week, French lawmakers mingling underneath crystal chandeliers spoke openly about their fears of a potential Donald Trump victory, according to an attendee. That was a day before France’s President Emmanuel Macron suffered steep losses to the far right, prompting him to dissolve the National Assembly and call snap elections. Concerns about migration and the burden of defending Ukraine are part of what is driving the rightward shift. Those have been central issues for the G7 since Biden joined the group in 2021 and promise to again be the driving topic for this year’s summit.
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