G7: Joe Biden has arrived in Japan, China and sanctions against Russia on the summit agenda

US President Joe Biden arrived in Japan on Thursday. He participates from Friday to Sunday in the summit of G7 leaders in Hiroshima (west of the country), temporarily leaving behind negotiations on the increase of the US debt.

His Air Force One plane landed shortly after 16 p.m. (9 a.m. in Paris) at the U.S. military base of Iwakuni, located about forty kilometers from Hiroshima. The head of state is then scheduled to meet in the early evening with Japanese Prime Minister Fumio Kishida.

The G7 brings together the leaders of seven of the most powerful and industrialized countries in the world: the United States, Japan, Germany, the United Kingdom, France, Italy and Canada. In addition, there is a presence of the European Union. China, the world's second-largest economy, is absent from this discussion forum.

Volodymyr Zelensky by videoconference

Discussions this week will include tightening sanctions against Russia in connection with the war in Ukraine as well as measures to protect against China's "economic coercion".

In particular, sanctions against the Russian diamond trade, which brings billions of dollars annually to Russia, must be taken, a European Union official said Thursday. "We think we need to limit Russian exports in this sector," he said, adding that the G7 is unlikely to reach a final agreement in Japan.

Russia exported nearly $5 billion (about €4.5 billion) worth of diamonds in 2021, according to the Observatory of Economic Complexity, a data visualization site on international trade created by the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT). The United Arab Emirates, India and Belgium, which is an EU member, are among the main importers.

The leaders of the G7 countries will try to present a united front against Russia and China but also on other strategic issues on which their interests are not always perfectly aligned. The United States and its allies have stepped up arms shipments to Ukraine, whose President Volodymyr Zelensky is due to attend the summit via video conference.

The nuclear threat in the background

According to US National Security Adviser Jake Sullivan, the talks are expected to focus on tightening sanctions against Russia that have led to a contraction of the Russian economy in the first quarter of 2023. He added that the leaders would discuss the fight against the circumvention of these sanctions, which allows Russian President Vladimir Putin to continue funding his war effort.

Putin's repeated threats to turn the war in Ukraine into a nuclear conflict have been roundly condemned by G7 leaders and are seen by some observers as an attempt to shake the resolve of Europeans and Americans.

The leaders' planned visit to Hiroshima Peace Memorial Park is expected to highlight these threats, where on August 6, 1945, the city was largely destroyed by an American atomic bomb, killing 140,000 people.

The France does not want an "anti-China G7"

The G7 is also expected to focus much of its discussions on China, and in particular on how to protect itself from possible economic blackmail by Beijing, the capital, by diversifying production and supply chains, while the Chinese government has shown willingness to use trade barriers. For Jake Sullivan, G7 leaders should denounce this "economic coercion" and work to overcome transatlantic differences on the position to adopt vis-à-vis China.

But European countries, especially France and Germany, are keen to ensure that eliminating risks does not mean severing ties with China, one of the world's largest markets. It is "not an anti-Chinese G7", insisted the French presidency ahead of the summit, hoping for "a positive message" of cooperation "provided that we negotiate together".

Japan has also invited eight third countries, including major emerging economies such as India and Brazil, to Hiroshima in an attempt to rally some leaders reluctant to oppose Russia's war in Ukraine and Beijing's growing military ambitions. India has close military ties with Russia and has never condemned the invasion of Ukraine.