BENGALURU, India – Finance leaders of the world’s biggest economies were entangled in differences on Saturday, February 25, over the war in Ukraine and on resolving the debt burden of distressed developing nations, participants said., hosted by India, was likely to end later in the day without a joint communique because there was no consensus on how to describe the conflict in Ukraine, delegates said.
India and China were among the nations that abstained on Thursday when UN voted overwhelmingly to demand Moscow withdraw its troops from Ukraine and stop fighting. The source and several other officials said barring a last-minute surprise, a consensus on the communique was unlikely and that the meeting was likely to end with a statement by the host summarising the discussions.
On the sidelines, the International Monetary Fund held a meeting on Saturday with the World Bank, China, India, Saudi Arabia and the G7 on restructuring debt for distressed economies, but there were disagreements among members, said IMF Managing Director Kristalina Georgieva. In a video address to the G20 meeting on Friday, Chinese Finance Minister Liu Kun reiterated Beijing’s position that the World Bank and other multilateral development banks participate in debt relief by taking haircuts alongside bilateral creditors.