Marco Rubio pulls plug on traditional photo op at meeting of foreign ministers after about one-third of countries threaten boycott
The traditional “family photo” to open the G20 foreign ministers’ meeting has been abruptly cancelled in the US after a host of nations – including Australia and the UK – refused to appear beside the Russian foreign minister, Sergei Lavrov.
The US secretary of state, Marco Rubio, pulled the plug after several European officials, the UK and Australia made it known they would boycott or walk out of the snapshot that often kicks off such international gatherings.
Rubio still opened the talks in Atlanta with an appeal for unity on the issues that threaten international security and trade.
They should be refusing to do anything with the US. The US is just as much the enemy as Russia is. Bunch of double standard hypocrites.
A lot of these nations are trying their best to simultaneously hold the door shut during these Trump years but keep a foot in the door to mend relations thereafter and should sensible Democrats return to power. Still, the volatility of US politics means these nations are forced to keep the US at arms-length because even if we elect another Obama (perceived extremely well by these nations) like El-Sayed, AOC, Talarico, etc. who’s to say in another 4 years we won’t elect another Trump… ? My guess is they will now expect systemic changes to prevent another Trump-like candidate hijacking the system, which is of course mostly dreaming as that would require major legislation and outright constitutional amendments. Tall order.
The United States have established that they’re incapable of stable relations. In world politics a decade is a short time and agreements are expected to last much longer than that. But the States have established that 180° turns can be expected every four years when sane presidents get elected and every couple weeks when it’s someone like Trump.
Living that down will require decades of very diligent attention to consistency and diplomacy.
I get that but. It’s still a shit strategy. Even if we elect Democrat house and Senate, followed by a Democrat president in 28. None of them should normalize relations till Democrats take basic steps to hold people accountable for what’s happened. And put actual rules and regulations with teeth in place to stop this from happening in the future. Not just norms and traditions that can be ignored. So realistically never trust us again.
And the corporations who own most of these politicians (democrats included) don’t want the changes that need to be made, as those changes will limit their influence. And they like the Trumps of this world who they can manipulate to give their industry whatever they want.
I tend to agree, but man… It sucks because that was exactly what Putin (and possibly Xi) desired to happen and have succeeded in that with Krasnov.
Xi was plenty involved as well. But this needs to be hung around the neck of every person in the GOP from now until the heat death of the universe.
Regardless what you think of the US and it’s history. Which for the record, it’s bad mmm’kay? But if you are someone that wants to see Americans succeed and the country improve. The GOP have actively been empowering and enabling the enemies of the people/country. For generations. Realistically we need to abolish any government at the federal level and anything close to that. But I don’t see that happening. So we need to do the next best thing. Taking this as a mandate to strengthen, improve and expand public education and services. So this doesn’t happen again in the future at the hands of an uneducated populace. None of this likely would have happened without the attacks to education etc.
Except that US policy changes every four years
Exactly! That’s sadly the problem.
Trump is a special flower
F
Let people vote and decide who their “enemy” is.
Men can’t even leave to escape this fascist death cult.
It seems as tho people are voting you the enemy. Well done.
Five eyes are now blinded by corruption from the magic massive pedo state
US running ops out of australia. Building bases as we speak
never stopped, bases exert control
What other option do we have?
EU/NATO isn’t an option for us, Europe will never ever lift a finger or risk a life for Australia. Despite us going to war to free you twice.
So we’re stuck with USA.
You are a commonwealth country. Elect leaders that want to forge ties with the UK ad EU. There are loads of us down there already.
Is Aistralia at enough risk to make it okay to be doing what you are doing for the US? To allow them to interfere with your elections?
Theyve been interfering since the CIA abducted Harold Holt and got Gough Whitlam removed from office. The damage is long done, and i wish i knew any way at all of fixing it.
The Greens refusing to provide military support to Ukraine, on top of Israeli shitbags slandering them, is really cutting into the only viable anti-US party we have.
No, it isn’t okay and no, at this stage probably not. I’m pretty clear, myself; ivexwanted us to backtrack from being a US base for years.
Their point stands, though; Europe will never lift a finger to aid Australia if there was a military issue. Their Americans already have, which is why we have such a close military bond. It helps to understand how we are as people; if you help us, you’re a mate forever.
Again, the points stand; Europe would never aid us and we’ve aided it twice.
Ties mean little if those ties will never result in a defense pact.
Europe won’t ever, no matter what, come to help us. France has made it quite clear multiple times, from the De Gaulle era through to today. US originally wanted Australia in NATO, it was De Gaulle who said no.
They say no to everything, they blocked Ireland joining the EU too. They are not all of Europe.
Help with what though, what military issues do you have that are not tied to being in with the US
Don’t you guys still have a monarch? Why can’t the commonwealth countries come together for mutual benefit?
If nato stays intact, why wouldn’t it come to Australians’ help?
Who invited ruzzia? Trump? It’s like inviting a skunk to a garden party!
Yeah the optics of just taking a G20 photo with US and Russia would have been pretty overt and blatant lol.
Another Helsinki 2018 repeat. Kudos to the countries who decided not be photographed with the Muscovite losers.
How many are willing to take photos with Trump, or Netanyahu?
Israel isn’t part of G20 and this wasn’t a leaders summit either.
Is the US?
Too many.
yeah. let’s focus on the “issues that threaten international security and trade”. Fucking let’s.
They didnt want to be photographed with any US politicians either.
It’s still so weird to me that a super power like the US acts so submissively to Russia. It’s like a South Park’s sketch, but without the joke
You mean they were willing to have their pictures taken with the USA representative?
Is Russia even in the top 20 by GDP? I know they weren’t one of the richest when they were in te G8 or whatever, kicked out after Ukraine.
Their economy sucks, they are fully industrialized but can’t even build their own military gear, scrapping components from consumer goods to make missiles and such like saddamm hussein back around 2000 when he was rumoured to by buying up all the playstations to use for guided missiles.
I digress though, Russia has bad leadership, always has really, so they never met their potential. Only oil and mining and such is really paying out for them last I heard.
According to this website (which claims IWF data), its currently 8th.
I don’t even know why we even bother. China has the most coal power plants of any country by 5x-6x. They have like 1,200, India is second with like 230 and the US is third with like 215. They’ve opened 50+ last year alone, the US hasn’t opened one since 2019 even with Trump pushing coal.
China spends a metric shit ton on propaganda (especially TicTok) to make you think they’re green.
Though China isn’t there yet, the share contributed by coal is declining. The reason solar panels have gotten as cheap as they are is thanks to Chinese production.
Just because they aren’t making the greatest visible strides yet, they would appear to be gearing up for a big shift. If their push for electric cars is anything to go by, they would appear capable of committing to change.
Meanwhile America and Europe are dragging their feet.
Just because they aren’t there yet, doesn’t mean we should give up.
Just because you see someone else littering, doesn’t mean it’s all useless and you might as well not bother with bins anymore.China is among the greatest polluters but it is also by a long shot the largest builder of renewable energy plants (solar, wind, you name it). The US on the other side is also among the greatest polluters, and there is also construction of renewable power sources but it is against the opposition from DC. The administration is not even indifferent, it is actively hostile to such projects, trying to prevent them.
China isn’t the good guy here but the definitely have invested a lot in reducing the impact of their industrial rise on air quality. That can be seen also by how dramatically air quality has improved in many large Chinese cities.
China has produced more Nuclear power plants than the entire world combined. They have installed more solar than the entire world combined. They have installed more hydro than the entire world combined. Yes, they have a lot of coal as well. Because they are simulataniously trying to raise the standard of living for 1.4 billion people, while meeting their climate goals which are far more aggressive than any other nation.
They also manufacture a lot of things for other countries. An important fact you’re leaving out of the discussion here…
I just wish they could all do the same to Israel… But I know it’s not going to happen. Israel is more evil than Russia… Israel is the modern day Nazis
I think if midterms weren’t so close, the US delegation would’ve still proceeded as yet another example of US leaning into BRICS.
I loved that the other nations did this because it was a statement for themselves, and forced the US into bad light.
This of course takes place at a trump resort.
