Issued on: 15/07/2022 – 08:02
Financial leaders of G20 member states will meet on Friday on the Indonesian island of Bali, amid discussions already dominated by the war in Ukraine. Follow FRANCE 24’s live blog for the latest developments. All times are Paris time (GMT+2).
07:00: Strong increase in funerals in Russian-occupied Ukraine, NGO reports
Satellite images and images on the ground show a sharp increase in burials in Russian-occupied areas of Ukraine, according to a report released Friday.
The non-governmental Center for Information Resilience analyzed images of burials in six areas – two of them were previously held by Russian troops and the rest are still under Moscow’s control in southern Ukraine.
“Open source information could provide unprecedented reach behind the front lines of the war in Ukraine and in Russian-occupied areas,” said Benjamin Strick, research director at CIR.
At the Starokrymske Cemetery in Mariupol, the report’s authors said about 1,000 new graves were seen over a period of about five months between October 21 and March 28.
The number of burials rose sharply thereafter, with 1,141 new graves found on satellite images between March 28 and May 12 and more than 1,700 between May 12 and June 29, the authors said.
The figures could not be independently verified.
3:54 AM: Hosts call on G20 members to focus on “building bridges” rather than politics
G20 financial leaders meeting in Bali must make progress in addressing the global economic threats posed by Russia’s war in Ukraine or the humanitarian consequences would be catastrophic, host country Indonesia said Friday.
Some Western ministers criticized Russian officials attending the talks, with US Treasury Secretary Janet Yellen saying Russia’s “cruel and unjust war” was solely responsible for the economic crisis the world now faces.
Financial leaders from the Group of 20 Major Economies meet on the holiday island, while host nation Indonesia tries to find common ground in a group battered by the war in Ukraine and mounting economic pressures from rising inflation.
Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, which the Kremlin calls a “special military operation,” has overshadowed recent G20 meetings, including last week’s meeting of foreign ministers.
Indonesia’s Finance Minister Sri Mulyani Indrawati said the world was hopeful that the group could resolve the threat of war, rising commodity prices and spillover effects on low-income countries’ ability to repay debt.
“We are well aware that the cost of our failure to cooperate is more than we can afford. The humanitarian consequences for the world, and especially for many low-income countries, would be catastrophic,” she said.
Mulyani called on G20 members to talk less about politics and “build bridges between each other” to deliver more technical decisions and concrete action.
(FRANCE 24 with AP, AFP and REUTERS)