Trump is making G-7 the toughest in years

THE G-7 presidents and prime ministers meet in Canada on Friday and Saturday in what is likely to prove one of the group's most challenging of such summits in many years. On a range of issues from trade to climate change and Iran, the United States appears to be dividing from key Western partners at a time of significant geopolitical and international economic turbulence, giving rise to talk of a "G-6 plus 1".

While the fissures within the G-7 did not begin with US President Donald Trump's election in 2016, they have been exacerbated by it. Since the collapse of the Soviet Union, there have been a series of intra-Western disagreements over issues from the Middle East, including the Iraq War opposed in 2003 by France and Germany; through to the rise of China with some European powers and the United States having disagreements over the best way to engage the rising super power.

Yet, despite occasional discord, key Western nations generally continued to agree - until the Trump presidency - around a broad range of issues such as international trade; backing for a Middle Eastern peace process between Israel and the Palestinians along Oslo principles; plus strong support for the international rules-based system and the supranational organisations that make this work. Yet today, more of these key principles are being disrupted if not outright undermined by Mr Trump's agenda.