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G7, China, and Trump
Leaders of the United States, Japan, Germany, France, the United Kingdom, Italy and Canada gathered this week for a G7 summit in Évian-les-Bains, France, while China remained outside the group.
El Mundo frames the absence of China as tied to the G7’s founding idea of “open and democratic” societies, adding that “Xi Jinping’s regime is out” because of “the ongoing repression of press freedom.”
Newsweek describes the 2026 summit as hosted by France from June 15 to 17, with the guest list presented as “the first draft of a post-American G7.”
In the same account, Newsweek says the summit’s original scheduling and choreography reflected uncertainty around Donald Trump, noting that “the Évian summit was originally scheduled to begin on June 14” and that Forbes reported the summit was moved.
China Shock 2.0
WKMG reports that for eight years the United States has waged economic war on China by “slapping big taxes on Chinese products before they enter America,” but says the campaign “hasn’t dented China’s industrial prowess.”
WKMG adds that China last year “notched a record global trade surplus — an astonishing $1.2 trillion,” and says the shift is redirecting exports away from the U.S. tariff wall toward “more open markets in Europe and elsewhere in Asia.”
The same report says French President Emmanuel Macron warned that Chinese exports are “literally killing a large part of the European industry’’ and admitted that Europe was “slow to see that.”
WKMG also quotes Maurice Obstfeld, saying “China’s export surge, unless its leaders rein it in, will provoke a protectionist wave against Chinese imports worldwide,” and links the concern to disruptions “around the Iran war” and a possible global slowdown.
Insurance, fuel, and leverage
Newsweek says the Évian summit’s invitees function as “the insurance policies,” and it places Qatar as “No. 8: Qatar, the Gas Valve Insurance Policy.”
In that account, Newsweek states that Qatar accounted for “18.8 percent of global LNG exports in 2024,” citing data from the International Gas Union, and it describes LNG as “one of the world’s most important energy levers.”
Newsweek then elevates the UAE as “No. 7: The UAE, the Oil and Money Insurance Policy,” describing it as both a hydrocarbon actor and a capital actor.
In WKMG’s framing of the G7 agenda, it says leaders of the G7 rich democracies gather in Évian-les-Bains, France, with China’s trade practices “near the top of the agenda,” even though the summit statement from Wednesday did not mention China by name.
