G7 talks focus on ways to fortify banks, supply chains as China accuses group of hypocrisy

Bank runs, cyber security and building more reliable supply chains to ensure economic security were among items on the agenda of closed-door financial talks Friday in Japan by the Group of Seven advanced economies.

Bank runs, cyber security and building more reliable supply chains to ensure economic security were among items on the agenda of closed-door financial talks Friday in Japan by the Group of Seven advanced economies.

Tensions with China, and with Russia over its war on Ukraine, loomed large on the wide horizon of issues the G7 is tackling this year in Japan, its only Asian member.

But while G7 finance ministers and central bank chiefs discussed ways to protect the international rules-based order and prevent what they are calling "economic coercion" by China, Beijing lashed back, accusing the club of wealthy nations of hypocrisy.

China is a victim of economic coercion, Chinese Foreign Ministry spokesperson Wang Wenbin said Friday.

"If any country should be criticized for economic coercion, it should be the United States. The U.S. has been overstretching the concept of national security, abusing export controls and taking discriminatory and unfair measures against foreign companies," Wang said in a routine news briefing.

China accuses Washington of hindering its rise as an increasingly affluent, modern nation through trade and investment restrictions that the United States says are needed to protect American economic security.

Speaking before the talks began, U.S. Treasury Secretary Janet Yellen said such measures are "narrowly targeted" and focused on national security.