Finance officials from the US, the European Union (EU) and France, among others, left a hybrid G20 meeting in Washington on Wednesday, in protest against Russia's presence and its invasion of Ukraine, US, community and French sources told Efe.
US Treasury Secretary Janet Yellen; French Finance Minister Bruno Le Maire and European Economy Commissioner Paolo Gentiloni were some of the leaders who expressed their disagreement with Russia's participation in the meeting and were absent from the meeting when it was already underway.
Specifically, Yellen and Gentiloni got up from their chairs just as Russian Finance Minister Anton Siluanov began to speak, American and community sources explained.
For his part, Le Maire, who joined virtually, spoke during the meeting and then left because he had other meetings, sources from the French Ministry of Economy told Efe.
According to these sources, both Le Maire and his G7 counterparts said in their speeches that Russia should refrain from participating in the G20 meetings.
That view, however, is not shared by other countries in the club of the 20 largest economies in the world, such as China and Indonesia, which this year holds the presidency of office.
Before the boycott of Russia, the Ukrainian Minister of Finance, Serhiy Marchenko, intervened, who was among the leaders who absent from the meeting or turned off the cameras of the computers from which they were participating, the US sources detailed.
The closed meeting began at 10:00 Washington local time (1400 GMT) and finance ministers are scheduled to hold a press conference at 15.30 local time (19.30 GMT).
Several countries had already questioned Russia's participation in the G20, while Russian troops continue to wage a war in Ukraine that has already claimed thousands of lives.
US President Joe Biden said at the end of March that Russia should be expelled from the G20 due to the invasion of Ukraine, noting that if that could not be done in Indonesia (the host country of the next summit), Ukraine should be allowed to attend the meetings.
The Kremlin has confirmed the intention of Russian President Vladimir Putin to attend the G20 summit in Indonesia later this year and for now the host country has maintained its invitation to the head of the Kremlin.
Russia was expelled from the Group of Eight most industrialized countries in the world (the G8) in 2014, after the annexation of the Ukrainian peninsula of Crimea, but maintains its presence in the G20.
(With information from EFE)
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