G7 Meeting Seeks To Unite on Dismantling Russia, Confronting China

March 24, 2022 (EIRNS)—The Group of Seven meeting today was primarily an effort to economically cripple Russia. As the White House statement put it: The G7 pledged to block transactions involving the Russian central bank’s gold reserves to hamper any Moscow bid to circumvent Western sanctions. The allies will work jointly “to blunt Russia’s ability to fund.... Putin’s war, including by making clear that any transaction involving gold ... is covered by existing sanctions.” In this brave new world, not only are bank deposits to be seized, but also gold, if coming from Russia, is to be spurned.

The G7 statement included a warning to Russia not to use biological, chemical, or nuclear weapons in Ukraine. “We warn against any threat of the use of chemical, biological and nuclear weapons or related material.” ABC News asked President Joe Biden at his press conference following the G7 meeting, whether a Russian chemical weapons attack could trigger a military confrontation between the U.S. and/or NATO with Russia. Biden only said that they would make that decision at the time.

The White House background briefing was somewhat more explicit. Key in its actions is breaking China from Russia. The G7 (and also the EU) is to commit to a “new sanctions evasion initiative that’s designed to prevent circumvention or backfilling of our unprecedented measures.” Also, “any transaction involving gold related to the Central Bank of Russia is prohibited.” Boycotting Russian gold is to close “down avenues, for example, for the Russian Central Bank to prop up the ruble.” But they had to grow “our coalition of countries to deny cutting-edge technology to Russia” and coordinate so as to “prevent the emergence of any safe haven for Russia, whether it’s in China or any other country.” Since China supplies some of

“the inputs for foundational technologies to Russia, whether it’s semiconductors or artificial intelligence or quantum or hypersonic flight.... And we just need—we want to make sure that for any of these technologies, including technologies that may be produced in China or designed in China, that we’re shutting down avenues for Russia to benefit from continued transactions with those countries too.”

At a press conference following the G7 meeting, the first question was what used to be a normal question. Regarding the charge that Russia was planning a chemical attack, was there any evidence that such was the case? Biden quickly shot that down, with the pretext, “I won’t answer that. I won’t give intelligence data.” Otherwise, Biden reviewed how he conveyed his non-threat to China, that President Xi Jinping saw all the corporations pulling out of Russia, and if China didn’t see the light and cooperate, China would also be in jeopardy. Biden then claimed that China understands that its economic future is much more closely tied to the West than to Russia.