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President Biden met with G7 leaders in an emergency session Sunday after reportedly telling Israel that the US would not take part in a counterstrike after Iran’s drone attack — and Iranian and Israeli authorities prepared for their next moves. “President Biden spoke by secure video with the leaders of the G7 today,” the White House wrote in a post on X above a photo of the commander in chief and his top diplomat, Secretary of State Antony Blinken, during the meeting, with other heads of Group of Seven countries appearing on a video screen behind them.

The G7 leaders, representing the countries with most of the world's wealth, convened a special video conference on Sunday, following the Iranian attack on Israel. During the meeting, the members decided to use all possible channels of influence, to prevent Israel from launching a retaliatory attack against Iran. Charles Michel, President of the European Council, said that " We unanimously condemned Iran's unprecedented attack against Israel. All sides must show restraint. We will continue all our efforts to work towards de-escalation. Ending the crisis in Gaza as soon as possible, notably through an immediate ceasefire, will make a difference." Ahead...

President Joe Biden vowed to stand by Ukraine 'as long as it takes' as he and fellow G7 leaders announced a new security deal for Kyiv. It came just one day after Volodymyr Zelensky launched a social media tirade against his Western allies over what he called an 'absurd' delay to setting out a pathway to his country's full membership of the NATO military alliance. 'We are going to be there as long as it takes,' Biden said in a speech flanked by fellow leaders from the G7, a club of the world's richest economies that includes Britain and France....

Japan was the only Group of Seven country to dispatch a male minister to the recently held G7 Ministerial Meeting on Gender Equality and Women’s Empowerment. The event, which closed Sunday, was attended by nine representatives of countries and organizations, with Japan’s gender equality minister Masanobu Ogura — who chaired the Nikko, Tochigi Prefecture meeting — being the sole official male presence. The gathering was expected to highlight women’s activities in Japan but ended up demonstrating the conspicuously small role women play in contemporary Japanese politics. The convocation was attended by G7 ministers and representatives of the European Union and...

Group of Seven (G7) nation officials will meet next week to consider problems posed by generative artificial intelligence (AI) tools like ChatGPT, Japan said on Friday. Leaders of the G7, which includes the United States, European Union and Japan, last week agreed to create an intergovernmental forum called the “Hiroshima AI process” to debate issues around fast-growing AI tools. G7 government officials will hold the first working-level AI meeting on May 30 and consider issues such as intellectual property protection, disinformation and how the technology should be governed, Japan’s communications minister, Takeaki Matsumoto, said. The meeting comes as tech regulators...

A Marine who refused to get the COVID-19 vaccine released from more than 100 days in the brig as she awaits a special court martial... Federal court documents revealed today showing the FBI abused a foreign spying law to target Americans.. In Syria government forces repelling a breakout attempt by a group of jihadists from the US base enclave... More than 10 blasts heard in Ukraine's capital Kiev early Saturday morning... The Greek Election this Sunday... Turkish politics the third-place candidate in the first presidential election round Sinan Ogan meeting President... A federal magistrate judge deciding to continue detention of...

Joe Biden is in Japan now for the G7 meeting, right in the middle of challenging debt negotiation meetings with the Republicans. That’s all on him because he delayed meeting with Republicans for so long. He had planned on being abroad longer, after the G7 but he’s amended his plans and will be coming back to try to make a deal after he got shamed into it by House Speaker Kevin McCarthy (R-CA). But now Biden is in Japan doing what he generally does when he’s overseas — embarrassing the heck out of us. Biden was meeting with other leaders...

Biden in Hiroshima, Japan on 5/19/23.

resident Joe Biden tripped as he walked down the stairs of the Itsukushima Shrine on Friday in his rush to greet Japanese Prime Minister Fumio Kishida. The president was running late - all the other G7 leaders had arrived on Miyajima Island and were waiting on him to begin the tour of the holy site - when he stumbled and caught himself before he fell. He and Kishida continued on as if the slip didn't happen, joining the rest of the heads of state to see the iconic 'floating' torii gate. The evening on the famous island, known for its...

Leaders of the world’s most powerful democracies vowed Friday to tighten punishments on Russia for its 15-month invasion of Ukraine, days before President Volodymyr Zelenskyy joins the Group of Seven summit in person on Sunday. “Our support for Ukraine will not waver,” the G7 leaders said in a statement released after closed-door meetings, vowing “to stand together against Russia’s illegal, unjustifiable, and unprovoked war of aggression against Ukraine.” “Russia started this war and can end this war,” they said. Zelenskyy will be making his furthest trip from his war-torn country as leaders prepare to unveil new sanctions on Russia for...

Joe Biden had planned on taking an extended trip overseas, centering around his G7 trip to Japan.But that would be right in the middle of debt negotiations with Republicans which he has been avoiding for months. He finally is in talks with the Republicans, but the trip as planned would have taken him away for several days beyond just going to Japan.House Speaker Kevin McCarthy (R-CA) excoriated Biden on Monday saying that running off like that when they needed to get this done showed that his priorities weren’t right and he wasn’t focused on America and what was best for...

The India-based Megh Updates platform, one of the world’s largest online informational platforms in terms of views, has stated that BRICS countries have officially overtaken G7 in share of world PPP GDP, and that this trend can be expected to continue. The BRICS currently include Brazil, Russia, India, China and South Africa, while the G7 includes Canada, France, Germany, Italy, Japan, the United Kingdom, and the United States, as well as the European Union. The BRICS is also expanding – Bangladesh, Egypt and the UAE have all just joined the BRICS New Development Bank, with numerous other countries poised to...

Ukraine needs “about two billion cubic meters” of additional gas to get through the winter, President Volodymyr Zelensky told G7 nations on Monday.During a video conference he also urged the G7 to send more weapons to Ukraine, including “modern tanks” as well as “rocket artillery and more long-range missiles”. “Unfortunately, Russia still has the advantage in artillery and missiles. This is a fact. These capabilities of the occupying army are the ones to fuel the Kremlin’s arrogance,” Zelensky said.

Nearly one million people have so far signed a petition to expel Iran’s ambassadors from the G7 countries in protest to the heavy crackdown on demonstrators. The campaign initiated by the founding members of “Iranians for Justice and Human Rights” called on the foreign ministers of the United Kingdom, Canada, the United States, Japan, Germany, France, and Italy to immediately designate the ambassadors or other representatives of the Islamic Republic in their countries

Leaders of some of the world’s largest economies reiterated their commitment to Ukraine and condemned Russia’s escalating aggression following a virtual meeting Tuesday morning, vowing to back Ukraine for “as long as it takes.” “We will continue to provide financial, humanitarian, military, diplomatic and legal support and will stand firmly with Ukraine for as long as it takes,” the G-7 group of nations said in a statement. “We are committed to supporting Ukraine in meeting its winter preparedness needs.”(snip) “We condemn these attacks in the strongest possible terms and recall that indiscriminate attacks on innocent civilian populations constitute a war...

It's a manic moment as male cactus bees envelop a single female. But who in this amorous scrum will emerge lucky and get to mate with her? This remarkable picture, captured by Karine Aigner, is the grand title winner in this year's Wildlife Photographer of the Year competition. On one level it's quite a technical image. It required the use of a macro probe lens to get in close to the very heart of the action. "I had to spend quite a bit of time on my belly in the dirt," Karine joked.

G7 finance ministers have agreed to impose a price cap on Russian oil exports in an effort to limit funding for President Putin's war in Ukraine. The decision was made at a virtual meeting of the group, made up of seven of the world's richest countries - the UK, US, Canada, Italy, France, Germany and Japan - on Friday afternoon. Confirming the news, Chancellor Nadhim Zahawi said: "We will curtail Putin's capacity to fund his war from oil exports by banning services, such as insurance and the provision of finance, to vessels carrying Russian oil above an agreed price cap."...

So, the G-7 leaders are in agreement, more war with Russia. Without actually saying exactly that, that was the main takeaway from he meeting of the most feckless leaders in the world. They also pledged $600 billion they don’t have to fund global infrastructure projects to ‘combat China’s Belt and Road Initiative.’ One wonders where all this money and, in the case of Europe, energy is going to come from to fund all of this. But the question I’ve had from the beginning of this obvious war of attrition the West wants to impose on Russia is the following: Do...

Led by U.S. President Joe Biden, the Group of Seven (G-7) economic powers today announced plans to ban the transport of Russian oil sold above a certain price with the goal of hurting Russia enough so that it ends its war against Ukraine. "There is only one way out: for Putin to accept that his plans in Ukraine will not succeed," said German Chancellor Olaf Scholz. The G-7’s plan is to impose a price cap on Russian oil through the regulation of petroleum shipping, banking, and insurance.The proposal is, in a word, ludicrous. Russian President Vladimir Putin would never agree...

World leaders at the Group of 7 summit in Germany signaled they will turn back to fossil fuels despite their commitments to a green energy transition thanks to the ongoing energy crisis. The war in Ukraine is heavily restricting fuel imports, with Russia cutting off European access to the Nord Stream pipeline and the US imposing a fuel embargo on Putin. As a result, the U.S. and European countries are abandoning their climate agenda to return to fossil fuels. Amid skyrocketing fuel prices, the Biden administration has been forced to abandon certain planks of its climate agenda. Biden called for...