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.
Another Helsinki 2018 repeat. Kudos to the countries who decided not be photographed with the Muscovite losers.
yeah. let’s focus on the “issues that threaten international security and trade”. Fucking let’s.
Why was Russia even invited this event? Oh right. He owns Trump and the entire U.S. administration.
Enjoy your Iranian Russian diesel folks and bring on the absolute utter wrong side of history.
They didnt want to be photographed with any US politicians either.
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.
They also manufacture a lot of things for other countries. An important fact you’re leaving out of the discussion here…
You mean they were willing to have their pictures taken with the USA representative?
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.
