Carney wraps up summit, dodging conflicts with Trump
Prime Minister Carney has just wrapped up this G7 summit with a closing press conference — and it was clear throughout he wanted to avoid what befell his predecessor the last time Canada hosted one of these events.
Justin Trudeau made a supposedly critical remark about Trump at the 2018 summit in Charlevoix, Que., which prompted a series of angry tweets, derailing the final hours of the meeting and the push for a G7 consensus on critical issues of the day.
The clearest sign of Carney’s reluctance to be overly critical of Trump and avoid Trudeau’s fate came on the question of a joint G7 statement on Ukraine.
A senior Canadian official had briefed reporters earlier Tuesday that such a statement was planned, but was dropped after the Americans wanted some of the tough language about Russia watered down out of fear it could torpedo their push to negotiate an end to that war.
Asked Tuesday night about the situation, Carney denied Trump was offside the other leaders on the issue — even saying Trump is a willing partner in pushing back against Russian aggression.
“Listen, I was there. I’m the chair of the G7 summit,” Carney said at point after facing some reporter pushback over the differing descriptions of what went down.
“I was there with President Trump and we discussed every word in that summary,” he said, referring to a separate so-called chair’s statement that Carney personally released tonight. That statement called for maximizing pressure on Russia, including through financial sanctions.
However, Carney did concede that the other countries would have gone further still if it were up to them — but it was a comment made with no derision.
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