{"id":305179,"date":"2025-11-21T13:10:07","date_gmt":"2025-11-21T13:10:07","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/305179\/"},"modified":"2025-11-21T13:10:07","modified_gmt":"2025-11-21T13:10:07","slug":"run-up-to-g20-in-south-africa-marred-by-hosts-simmering-row-with-us-g20","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/305179\/","title":{"rendered":"Run-up to G20 in South Africa marred by host\u2019s simmering row with US | G20"},"content":{"rendered":"

The dispute between South Africa<\/a> and the US over the Trump administration\u2019s decision to boycott the G20 in Johannesburg has continued, with South Africa objecting to a US plan for a junior embassy official to take part in the closing ceremony meant to mark the handover to the next summit, which will take place in Florida.<\/p>\n

The two-day summit, which opens on Saturday, comes at a febrile moment in global politics. The US has proposed a deal to end Russia\u2019s invasion of Ukraine, which it agreed with Moscow without the involvement of Ukraine<\/a> or the EU.<\/p>\n

Washington has also been accusing South Africa for months of racial discrimination<\/a> against minority white Afrikaners<\/a>, who ruled the country during apartheid, which South Africa has vehemently rejected.<\/p>\n

The country\u2019s president, Cyril Ramaphosa, told a press conference<\/a> on Thursday that the US had had a change of mind about participating in the G20 and that the two sides were discussing what form US involvement could take. He had said earlier in the day that countries should not be bullied and that their sovereignty should be respected.<\/p>\n

The White House press secretary, Karoline Leavitt, hit back: \u201cThe US is not participating in official talks at the G20 in South Africa<\/a>. I saw the South African president running his mouth a little bit against the United States and the president of the United States earlier today, and that language is not appreciated by the president or his team.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe ambassador or the representative of the embassy in South Africa is simply there to recognise that the United States will be the host of the G20<\/a> [next year]. They are receiving that send-off at the end of that event. They are not there to participate in official talks, despite what the South African president is falsely claiming.\u201d<\/p>\n

The US does not currently have an ambassador in Pretoria, with Marc Dillard the acting ambassador or charg\u00e9 d\u2019affaires.<\/p>\n

Many South Africans reacted furiously to what they perceived as a snub to their country. The foreign ministry, Chrispin Phiri, said: \u201cPresident will not be handing over to a junior embassy official.\u201d<\/p>\n

Ramaphosa had previously said he would hand the G20 presidency to an \u201cempty chair\u201d, but that he would have preferred to give it directly to Donald Trump.<\/p>\n

People in Johannesburg take part in a lie-down protest over violence against women to coincide with the G20 summit. Photograph: Ihsaan Haffejee\/AFP\/Getty Images<\/p>\n

The 2026 summit will take place at the Trump National Doral Miami golf resort in Florida, which is owned by the Trump Organization.<\/p>\n

Analysts said the US boycott of the G20 was more likely to harm than help its global standing. Marisa Louren\u00e7o, a political risk consultant based in Johannesburg, said: \u201cChina or India in the past might get criticised for certain actions \u2026 Now the US is really being seen as the unreasonable one, because it\u2019s becoming clearer and clearer that what it\u2019s doing to South Africa is just completely misguided.\u201d<\/p>\n

The G20 was founded in 1999 after the Asian financial crisis. It was envisaged as a broader alternative to the G7 for the world\u2019s largest economies and the EU to try to find common positions on global economic and financial issues.<\/p>\n

South Africa has taken great pride in being the first African country to preside over the G20, presenting itself as a champion of issues important to many countries on the continent. These include high levels of public debt and how to get the most benefit from the growing demand for \u201ccritical minerals\u201d used in green technologies and found in many parts of the region.<\/p>\n

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The country\u2019s other priorities for its year leading the G20 are to increase financing for a \u201cjust energy transition\u201d – moving away from fossil fuels while preserving economic livelihoods – and improve disaster resilience and responses.<\/p>\n

As part of his G20 presidency, Ramaphosa commissioned reports into Africa\u2019s high debt levels and global inequality. The latter<\/a>, produced by a panel independent experts led by the Nobel prize-winning economist Joseph Stiglitz, cited data showing that the world\u2019s wealthiest 1% had captured 41% of all wealth generated between 2000 and 2024, while the poorest 50% had received just 1%.<\/p>\n

The panel recommended the formation of an independent body to synthesise data and research on inequality and assess the effectiveness of policies to tackle it. Ramaphosa, Brazil\u2019s president, Luiz In\u00e1cio Lula da Silva, and Spain\u2019s prime minister, Pedro S\u00e1nchez, also threw their weight behind the proposal in a Financial Times opinion piece<\/a> on Thursday.<\/p>\n

Jayati Ghosh, an economics professor at University of Massachusetts Amherst and one of thepanel members, told reporters: \u201cWealth concentration is growing. Income inequality is also a result of that, but we found wealth inequality to be even possibly the biggest problem, because it generates also greater inequality of power.\u201d<\/p>\n

Winnie Byanyima, the executive director of UNAids and another panel member said the independent monitoring body, which the panel compared to the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, could be formed without a G20 resolution or US involvement. \u201cIt doesn\u2019t have to start with a consensus, it can start with those who want to take it forward,\u201d said Byanyima, who will address G20 leaders on inequality on Saturday.<\/p>\n

Protests over violence against women have been timed across South Africa to coincide with the G20. At midday on Friday, thousands of people lay down for 15 minutes of silence in memory of the 15 women murdered on average every day in the country.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"The dispute between South Africa and the US over the Trump administration\u2019s decision to boycott the G20 in…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":305180,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[18],"tags":[23,3,21,19,22,20,25,24],"class_list":["post-305179","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-united-states","tag-america","tag-news","tag-united-states","tag-united-states-of-america","tag-unitedstates","tag-unitedstatesofamerica","tag-us","tag-usa"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/305179","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=305179"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/305179\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/305180"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=305179"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=305179"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=305179"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}