G20

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</div><div>Last week, two important meetings took place—one, in Buenos Aires, Argentina, of the Group of 20 (G20) nations, and two, in Vienna, Austria, of the Organization of the Petroleum Exporting Countries (OPEC) and other oil producers. The two meetings did not produce any resolution to the major economic challenges in the world. But they did soothe the nerves of financial markets. At the G20, the United States and China dialed down the temperature over trade but did not settle the long-term grievances each side has of the other. At the OPEC+ meeting, Russia and Saudi Arabia agreed to cut production and raise the price of oil despite pressure from the United States and others to keep oil prices low.At neither meeting did the major powers find solutions to their problems. They are all caught in mazes from which there are no easy exits. But what calmed the world of finance was that the geopolitical tension between the major powers seemed to have lessened. What impact this reduced tension has for the world’s people, however, is not clear.TradeThe “trade war” engineered by U.S. President Donald Trump against China began with tariffs and ended with a damp squib. At the G20, Trump told China’s Xi Jinping that the U.S. tariffs that would have gone up to 25 percent on $200 billion worth of Chinese imports will no longer be applied. China, for its part, said that it would import more goods from the United States. No specifics were announced, which is why the tensions over even this agreement spilled over onto Twitter (courtesy of Trump’s hyperbole) and into more sober statements from the Chinese government.<interaction data-token="5b96855f8198b4e625350260" data-context="true" data-tags="" data-fallback="true" style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);" />The more fundamental questions of intellectual property and currency valuation remain unsolved. The United States accuses China of theft of the intellectual property of U.S. firms, but the Chinese counter—as they have in the arbitration panels of the World Trade Organization—that they merely draw from technology transferred as a result of commercial agreements freely made by firms eager to use Chinese labor. It will be impossible to resolve these two problems, since neither side sees the issues in the same way. Their worldviews regarding intellectual property and currency valuation are utterly alien to each other. If the United States believes that China is unfairly valuing its currency, the Chinese point to the unfair advantage that the dollar has over every currency in the world since it is used as one of the major global currencies for facilitation of trade and for the storage of wealth.OilRussia’s Vladimir Putin and Saudi Arabia’s Mohammed bin Salman offered each other a friendly hand slap at the G20. Everyone seemed happy to see Mohammed bin Salman, despite the clear evidence of his role in the murder of the Saudi journalist Jamal Khashoggi.But the real agreements between Russia and Saudi Arabia were not directly made in Buenos Aires. They were made more quietly in Vienna at the OPEC+ meeting. At Buenos Aires, Putin said, “yes, we have an agreement to prolong our accords.” He was referring to the deal between Russia and Saudi Arabia since 2016 to manage oil prices to their mutual benefit. The deal notwithstanding, Saudi Arabia has continued to pump itself into trouble—flooding the market with oil, driving prices down and depleting its own treasury as a result. Now Russia is eager to see oil production cuts and oil prices rise. Trapped by sanctions and by low oil prices, Russia has plunged into internal economic difficulties. The real issue was how much each country inside and outside OPEC should pump. That is why Putin said, “there is no final deal on volumes.” In fact, even after the deal has begun to emerge, there is no final deal. Saudi Arabia has not been a good partner here. It has pumped outside the numbers over the course of the past few years, largely under pressure from the United States.There are two reasons why the United States wants low oil prices, despite the fact that the U.S. is now one of the world’s largest oil producers. First, low oil prices mean an immediate subsidy for the U.S. consumer and for U.S. manufacturing firms. There is no economic incentive to move to renewable energy when oil prices are low. Second, low oil prices hit adversaries of the U.S.-led world order that—as it happens—are major oil producers. The list includes Iran and Venezuela, two countries that have been sent into internal turmoil as oil prices have plummeted. But the United States has sufficient tools to hurt these countries without forcing oil prices down. For instance, even if oil prices rise, U.S. sanctions can be harsh enough to cut Iranian and Venezuelan oil out of the market. The lack of Iranian and Venezuelan oil operates as an effective cut in oil production, which will itself raise oil prices.Saudi Arabia has already begun to pressure Libya and Nigeria to reduce oil exports, although both these African countries are reliant upon oil revenues. Saudi Arabia has succeeded in pushing Qatar out of OPEC on political grounds, but since Qatar only produces 2 percent of OPEC’s crude oil the departure, Qatexit is not meaningful. Inside the world of oil, there are those who are always pushed aside so that others can benefit.Oil Buyers’ ClubIn 2005, Indian Petroleum Minister Mani Shankar Aiyar assembled his counterparts from across Asia to start a discussion on a buyers’ club. The precise issue on the table was the “Asian Premium” charged by Saudi Arabia and other oil producers to Asian countries. The “Asian Premium” is substantial—close to $10 billion per year for the Asian consumers of Gulf oil. It is what bothered Aiyar and the other oil ministers. But they did not come to any agreement.Asia is the largest importer of oil in the world. India and China, with the United States, are the three largest importers of oil. Right behind them are Japan and South Korea. If you add the oil imports by China, India, Japan and South Korea, then these four Asian countries import a full third of world oil imports. They are both reliant upon the oil exporters, but they also have power as a bloc of consumers.In 2012, China’s premier Wen Jiabao said that there needed to be a counter-cartel to OPEC that should include Europe and the United States. Interest in his proposal was minimal. Oil had reached $100 per barrel. It stifled economic growth and did not move any of these industrial giants toward non-carbon renewable fuel.The issue of a buyers’ cartel came back on the table in April this year at the International Energy Forum. The chairman of Indian Oil Corporation (IOC) Sanjiv Singh and the chairman of China National Petroleum Corporation (CNPC) Wang Yilin then met in Beijing to go deeper into the possibility. By June, China and India—which import 17 percent of the world’s oil—had begun to openly talk about a buyers’ cartel to help create “stable and moderate” oil prices, as India’s current Petroleum Minister Dharmendra Pradhan put it.China and India have been upset by the U.S. sanctions on Iran. They have felt that these produce an adverse impact on Asian economies. They are joined by Japan and the European Union, who are also not pleased with these sanctions. It is now being said that if China and India establish a buyers’ club, Japan and Europe will join in.Smell of Tear GasFrom the air-conditioned rooms of the oligarchy, we go to the tear gas of the streets.Protests in Paris, France, have been the most violent in decades. The yellow vests (gilets jaunes) appeared as if out of nowhere to demonstrate against the French government’s hike in fuel prices. They make the case that the violence of the economy has destroyed their ability to function. Any violence on the streets is a reflection of the violence that structures their lives. The streets of Paris smelled of tear gas.In Buenos Aires, Argentina, labor unions and political groups of one kind or another planned massive protests against the G20. They wanted to scream at their leaders, who have been deaf to their pleas. But the Argentinian government held the G20 meeting at the Costa Salguero convention center, on the magnificent Rio de La Plata. Police cordoned off the area, while the coast guard boats sailed up and down the river. No one could get near the site. None of the leaders were interrupted by the chants.There were no protests in Vienna. The OPEC building was nonetheless surrounded by the elite WEGA units. No one knew that the meeting was being held. There is so little democracy in the institutions that structure our lives.This article was produced by <a href="https://independentmediainstitute.org/globetrotter/" style="text-decoration-line: none;">Globetrotter</a>, a project of the Independent Media Institute.</div><div>
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</div><div style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);"><div>The Global Power Elite works out policies to advance their</div><div>interests with regard to the management and protection of</div><div>global capital and the enforcement of debt collection worldwide</div><div>in such private policymaking forums as the World Economic</div><div>Forum, Trilateral Commission, Group of 30, Atlantic Council,</div><div>
</div><div>and Bilderberg Group, and in such transnational state institu-</div><div>tions as the World Bank, International Monetary Fund, G20, and</div><div>
</div><div>Bank for International Settlements.</div></div><div style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);">=</div></div><div></div><div><a href="https://www.democracynow.org/2017/7/10/headlines/at_g20_summit_all_countries_but_us_agree_paris_climate_deal_is_irreversible">https://www.democracynow.org/2017/7/10/headlines/at_g20_summit_all_countries_but_us_agree_paris_climate_deal_is_irreversible</a></div><div>
</div><div>=</div><div>but</div><div>
</div><div><a href="https://www.democracynow.org/2017/7/10/even_as_all_g20_countries_except">https://www.democracynow.org/2017/7/10/even_as_all_g20_countries_except</a></div><div>
</div><div><div class="story_summary" style="box-sizing: border-box;"><div class="text" style="box-sizing: border-box; line-height: 27px; letter-spacing: -0.2px;">Saturday, world leaders broke with the United States on climate change and reaffirmed their commitment to the Paris climate agreement, which they called "irreversible." The final joint statement from the G20 summit in Hamburg, Germany, took the unusual step of acknowledging the U.S. rejection of the Paris deal while reiterating the rest of the world’s support for the landmark climate agreement. Meanwhile, a group of environmental organizations have released a new report claiming G20 governments provide an average of $72 billion per year in public finance for fossil fuels—nearly four times as much as they provide for clean energy. The report is titled "Talk is Cheap: How G20 Governments Are Financing Climate Disaster." We speak to the report’s lead author, Alex Doukas, senior campaigner at Oil Change International.</div><hr class="hidden-xs" style="background: rgb(236, 238, 239); box-sizing: content-box; height: 1px; margin: 40px 0px; border: none; clear: both;" /></div><div class="mobile_anchor_target" id="transcript" style="box-sizing: border-box;"><h5 class="transcript" style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255); box-sizing: border-box; margin: 0px 0px 10px; line-height: 1;">Transcript rush</h5><div class="text" style="box-sizing: border-box; line-height: 27px; letter-spacing: -0.2px;">AMY GOODMAN: This is Democracy Now!, democracynow.org, The War and Peace Report. I’m Amy Goodman, with Juan González.JUAN GONZÁLEZ: Well, on Saturday, world leaders broke with the United States on climate change and reaffirmed their commitment to the Paris climate agreement, which they called, quote, "irreversible." The final joint statement from the G20 summit in Hamburg, Germany, took the unusual step of acknowledging the U.S. rejection of the Paris deal while reiterating the rest of the world’s support for the landmark climate agreement.AMY GOODMAN: The German chancellor, Angela Merkel, said she "deplored" the U.S. decision to pull out of the Paris accord. And British Prime Minister Theresa May said she was "dismayed" by Trump’s decision.<blockquote style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255); box-sizing: border-box; margin: 0px; padding-left: 30px; border-left: 3px solid rgb(241, 242, 243);">PRIME MINISTER THERESA MAY: Like other world leaders here, I’m dismayed at the U.S. decision to pull out of the Paris Agreement. And I’ve urged President Trump to rejoin the Paris Agreement. The U.K.’s own commitment to the Paris Agreement and tackling global climate change is as strong as ever.</blockquote>JUAN GONZÁLEZ: Early Saturday morning, Greenpeace activists outside the G20 summit called on world leaders to raise their level of ambition beyond the Paris climate accord. Sixty-five activists from several European countries scaled the Köhlbrand Bridge in Hamburg, Germany, and displayed a gigantic banner that simply stated, quote, "End Coal."AMY GOODMAN: Meanwhile, a group of environmental organizations have released a new <a href="http://priceofoil.org/2017/07/05/g20-financing-climate-disaster/" style="box-sizing: border-box; background-color: transparent; border: 0px;">report</a> claiming G20 governments provide an average of $72 billion per year in public finance for fossil fuels—nearly four times as much as they provide for clean energy. The report is titled "Talk is Cheap: How G20 Governments Are Financing Climate Disaster"For more, we go to Washington, D.C., where we’re joined by the report’s lead author, Alex Doukas, senior campaigner at Oil Change International.Alex, talk about what you found.ALEX DOUKAS: Thanks, Amy. Yeah, we found, as you mentioned, that $72 billion, on average, per year is flowing from G20 governments through their public finance institutions to support the production of oil, gas and coal. As you mentioned, that’s more—nearly four times as much as they’re providing for clean energy. And that’s on top of subsidies that they provide domestically to their domestic oil, gas and coal companies—so, for example, in the United States, all of the industry-specific tax breaks that ExxonMobil and Chevron and other oil corporations benefit from. So, on the whole, we’re talking about a huge amount of government support for fossil fuel production.And while it’s excellent that the other G20 leaders put Donald Trump in a corner and became the G19 in standing behind the Paris Agreement, it’s not enough just to say, "We’re not Trump when it comes to climate change." It’s not enough to simply confront his climate denial. These leaders have to act. They need to be putting their money where their mouths are.JUAN GONZÁLEZ: Well, could you give us some specifics of how these supports work, some of the most egregious examples that you found in your report?ALEX DOUKAS: Sure. There’s still actually public finance for coal-fired power plants. Most of the finance that we looked at in the report is international finance, so, for example, money coming from U.S. or Japanese or Chinese public finance institutions supporting coal-fired power plants around the world. We’ve also looked at oil and gas finance and found that it’s nearly half of all public finance for energy provided by G20 governments. So it dwarfs all other sources of energy in terms of the public support, especially into things like liquefied natural gas. And we’re seeing an increasing trend in this public finance and public investment in natural gas infrastructure. And the G20 government, even with Trump in their climate—the G20 leaders, even in their climate and energy action plan, with Trump, agreed that they called natural gas a clean fuel, which it certainly is not. And that’s something that we want to point out, is that these fossil fuels and public investment in fossil fuels aren’t at all consistent with the aims outlined in the Paris Agreement, which all of these G20 leaders, except for Trump, are happy to continue trumpeting.AMY GOODMAN: Alex, I wanted to ask you about what happened after the G20 summit, when Secretary of State Rex Tillerson flew to Istanbul, Turkey, to receive the World Petroleum Congress’s lifetime achievement award in recognition of his outstanding contribution to the oil and gas industry.Meanwhile, Tillerson could soon be called to testify about a separate email account he used for years to discuss global warming while he served as CEO of ExxonMobil. That’s according to the Associated Press, which reports that the New York attorney general, Eric Schneiderman, is prepared to question Tillerson as part of his probe into whether Exxon misled its investors about the impact of climate change. Those separate emails, he went under a separate name, "Wayne Tracker."During his Senate hearing in January, Tillerson refused to answer questions about Exxon’s history of denying the science of climate change, telling senators scientific literature on climate change is, quote, "inconclusive." He was asked about those reports by Virginia Democrat Tim Kaine.<blockquote style="box-sizing: border-box; margin: 0px; padding-left: 30px; border-left: 3px solid rgb(241, 242, 243);">SEN. TIM KAINE: Are these conclusions about ExxonMobil’s history of promoting and funding climate science denial, despite its internal awareness of the reality of climate change, during your tenure with the company true or false?REX TILLERSON: Senator, since I’m no longer with ExxonMobil, I’m in no position to speak on their behalf. The question would have to be put to them.</blockquote><blockquote style="box-sizing: border-box; margin: 0px; padding-left: 30px; border-left: 3px solid rgb(241, 242, 243); padding-top: 30px !important;">SEN. TIM KAINE: And let me ask you: Do you lack the knowledge to answer my question, or are you refusing to answer my question?</blockquote><blockquote style="box-sizing: border-box; margin: 0px; padding-left: 30px; border-left: 3px solid rgb(241, 242, 243); padding-top: 30px !important;">REX TILLERSON: A little of both.</blockquote><blockquote style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255); box-sizing: border-box; margin: 0px; padding-left: 30px; border-left: 3px solid rgb(241, 242, 243); padding-top: 30px !important;">SEN. TIM KAINE: Um, I have a hard time believing you lack the knowledge to answer my question.</blockquote>AMY GOODMAN: So, that was Tim Kaine questioning Rex Tillerson. He just received this lifetime achievement award in Turkey. And certainly, the U.S. was isolated at G20 when it came to Trump having pulled out of the climate accord. But you’re making this bigger point, Alex Doukas, that—are you saying, are the other countries any better? And if so, what countries do you think are taking the right path when it comes to climate change?ALEX DOUKAS: Look, I think that a lot of these other countries are better in word, if not yet in deed. And that’s—it is important, but it’s also a crisis of immense proportions, and we can’t just be talking about taking climate action anymore. We have to be taking climate action. So, even Germany’s government, the host of the G20 this year, with Chancellor Merkel at the helm, has been providing more public finance to fossil fuels than to clean energy. Same with Canada. So, these are countries where, you know, Justin Trudeau, Angela Merkel, they have lofty rhetoric about climate change, yet their public finance is still—the bulk of it’s still going into fossil fuels, their public energy finance, rather than to clean energy. And that’s something that needs to change immediately.AMY GOODMAN: And the—ALEX DOUKAS: So I wouldn’t say that they’re—sorry, go ahead.AMY GOODMAN: And the significance of Tillerson possibly being subpoenaed to testify in this New York lawsuit?ALEX DOUKAS: I think it’s very significant. And I think it will be interesting to see what comes out of that process, if he is made to testify. We’ll see—we’ll see if Wayne Tracker, or Rex Tillerson, shows up on the stand.But I think one thing that this really highlights, both the fact that he’s been compelled to testify potentially in this case for misleading investors about the realities and risks of climate change, but also his receiving this award for lifetime achievement for his work in the petroleum industry, it really lays something bare that is often under the surface in the United States, which is that we need to separate oil and state. And this isn’t a thing that’s a problem only in the U.S. It’s a particular problem in the United States. But instead of having intermediaries, where we have, you know, lobbyists or campaign contributions to politicians from the oil, gas and coal industries, and then the subsidies flowing back from those decisionmakers to those industries, now we have the oil industry actually in charge of large parts of the United States government, including foreign policy at the State Department with Rex Tillerson. And I think that is a stark picture, and it’s something that we need to wake up and address.JUAN GONZÁLEZ: And, well, there have also been reports recently of the industry having an impact here at the state level in getting state governments to penalize folks who switch to solar, to solar energy, and an attempt to charge them, in effect, for being able to switch to solar energy.ALEX DOUKAS: Well, that’s a big problem, and it’s something that we need to keep an eye on. There was some political backlash for politicians that tried to penalize homeowners for putting solar on their roofs in Nevada recently. And that’s something that I think state legislators and politicians should be aware of, that if they’re going to try and take away the ability of consumers to use cleaner energy, that there may be a penalty at the ballot box for that.AMY GOODMAN: Well, Alex Doukas, we want to thank you for being with us, senior campaigner at Oil Change international, lead writer and researcher for the new <a href="http://priceofoil.org/2017/07/05/g20-financing-climate-disaster/" style="box-sizing: border-box; background-color: transparent; border: 0px;">report</a>, "Talk is Cheap: How G20 Governments Are Financing Climate Disaster." And we’ll link to it at democracynow.org.</div></div></div><div></div></div>