The leaders of the world's eight major industrialized countries and
five major developing countries focused on trade and climate change on
the second day of their summit in Italy Thursday.
The G-8 leaders meeting in the central city of L'Aquila with their
counterparts from Brazil, China, India, Mexico and South Africa agreed
on the need for completing the stalled Doha round of world trade talks
by next year.
They also pressed their counterparts from developing nations to back
their agreement Wednesday for deep cuts by 2050 in greenhouse gas
emissions, which are widely blamed for global warming. But the
developing nations, led by China and India, refused to commit to
specific goals.
United Nations Secretary General Ban Ki-moon criticized the G-8 countries for insufficient progress on global warming.
U.S. President Barack Obama met with Brazil's President Luis Inacio
Lula da Silva on climate change, energy, the political crisis in
Honduras and Iran.
White House spokesmanRobert Gibbs said Mr. Obama
expressed hope that Brazil would use its close commercial ties with
Iran to strongly communicate the G-8 position on the Islamic country.
A G-8 statement Wednesday said leaders are losing patience with Iran's
refusal to abandon a suspected nuclear weapons program. The statement
also condemned post-election violence in Iran and the arrest of
journalists there.
On the first day of the three-day economic summit Wednesday, the G-8
released a statement saying the global economy appears to be
stabilizing but still faces significant risks.
The G-8 also released a statement condemning North Korea's nuclear weapons program and conducting missile tests.
The Group of Eight is made up of the world's major industrialized
nations including the United States, Japan, Germany, France, Britain,
Italy, Canada and Russia.