G20 leaders meet in Rome from Saturday, October 30.

On the agenda: the fight against Covid-19, the global economic recovery but, above all, the climate as COP26 is due to start on Sunday in Glasgow, Scotland.

"On all our climate objectives, we have a long way to go and we must accelerate the pace," reiterated on Friday, the UN secretary general, Antonio Guterres, who continues to sound the alarm on the risk of "climate catastrophe" and points to the "particular responsibility" of the G20 countries.

This group, which includes the United States, the European Union, but also China, Russia and India, among others, accounts for the bulk of global emissions. 

"We still have time to get things back on track and this G20 meeting is an opportunity to do that," he insisted.

Rome to Glasgow

Heads of State and Government will indeed leave for Glasgow after the G20 meeting ended Sunday in Rome.

But their ability to agree this weekend on strong commitments for the climate is not guaranteed.

The head of the Italian government Mario Draghi had pleaded at the beginning of October for "a commitment of the G20 on the need to limit the rise in temperatures to 1.5 degrees", the most ambitious objective of the Paris agreement. 

"We are not going to stop global warming in Rome or at this meeting of the COP," admitted British Prime Minister Boris Johnson on the plane bringing him to the Italian capital.

"The most we can hope for is to slow the rise" in temperatures.

In this context, to what extent are the leaders of the world's major economies ready to commit to abandoning coal?

Boris Johnson also said he insisted on "the potential to get out of coal" during a telephone conversation on Friday with Chinese President Xi Jinping who, like his Russian counterpart Vladimir Poutine, will only participate in the G20 by videoconference.

Beijing showed a sign of inflection by promising in September to stop building coal-fired power plants abroad.

But China, and with it many emerging countries, still depends heavily on this fossil fuel, which emits a lot of CO2, in particular to run its power plants in the current context of the energy crisis.

Shortages and economic recovery

The shortages and problems that multiply in the global supply chain, and threaten to derail the pace of economic recovery, were on the menu of discussions in Rome this weekend, which will also address the debt of the poorest countries. or efforts to vaccinate the planet against Covid-19.

But the only certainty of concrete progress for this G20 summit with moderate ambitions concerns taxation.

It should indeed ratify at the highest political level the minimum global taxation at 15% on multinationals.

The challenge now is to implement this system in each country, which will reduce the possibilities of tax optimization for multinationals and should bring in 150 billion euros in additional revenue.

The stated goal is 2023.

Several demonstrations are planned for Saturday in Rome (unions, extreme left, Fridays for Future), with thousands of people expected.

More than 5,000 police officers, riflemen and soldiers were mobilized, the Italian capital will be constantly flown over by helicopters and drones, and the district where the summit is held has been "bunkerized".

The leaders will also take advantage of their face-to-face return to a large international meeting for the first time since the start of the pandemic to increase bilateral or small committee meetings.

On Saturday, US Presidents Joe Biden and French Presidents Emmanuel Macron, as well as German Chancellor Angela Merkel and British Prime Minister Boris Johnson, want to agree on a resumption of negotiations with Iran.

Emmanuel Macron, who has already staged his reconciliation with Joe Biden on Friday after the submarine affair, also planned to meet Boris Johnson on Sunday, against the backdrop of a crisis between their two countries on post-Brexit fishing.

 With AFP

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