Buenos Aires: The 13th G20 summit ended with a number of big outcomes as India announced that the country will be hosting the summit in 2022. US President Donald Trump and his Chinese counterpart Xi Jinping also came to a truce on the ongoing trade wars.
Speaking at the G20 summit, Prime Minister Narendra Modi said, "It's India's 75th Independence Day in 2022 and we had requested Italy if we can get 2022 instead of 2021 (for hosting G20 summit). They accepted our request, others accepted it too.I'm grateful & I invite leadership from across the world to come to India in 2022".
Italy and India swapped year for hosting G20 summit. Italy will be hosting G20 Summit in 2021. Italian PM Giuseppe Conte said it was "very important for India to celebrate its 75th anniversary of Independence with our presence and therefore I decide to accept the swap".
In Asia, South Korea hosted G20 in 2010, followed by Turkey in 2015 and China in 2016.
On global outcomes, Trump and Xi met for almost two-and-a-half-hours on a working dinner. Later in a press statement, the White House said, "President Trump has agreed that on January 1, 2019, he will leave the tariffs on USD 200 billion worth of product at the 10 per cent rate, and not raise it to 25 per cent this time."
According to the White House, China also agreed to purchase "very substantial" amount of agricultural, energy, industrial, and other product from the US to "reduce the trade imbalance between our two countries". US President has been calling on Bejing to reduce the trade deficit with Washington.
Trump and Xi have also agreed to "immediately" begin negotiations on "structural changes" with respect to forced technology transfer, intellectual property protection, non-tariff barriers, cyber intrusions and cyber theft, services and agriculture. Both agreed that this will be completed within the next 90 days.
The US President also said, “This was an amazing and productive meeting with unlimited possibilities for both the United States and China. It is my great honor to be working with President Xi.”
PM Modi also spoke on the ongoing trade wars between world number one and number 2 economy, saying it has a "collateral" impact on emerging economies.
Terror and the issue of fugitive economic offenders remained the key focus and PM Modi called on the need to "implement the 11-point action plan against terrorism which was issued as a stand-alone statement at the summit in Hamburg in 2017".
India's Sherpa or Chief negotiator, Shaktikanta Das, replying to a question on terror said, "PM Modi raised the issue of terror and the way it undermines human life and also economies and society. PM Modi emphasised that the Hamburg declaration should be implemented by all countries. "
PM Modi had also given a 9-point agenda to tackle fugitive economic offenders which called on Financial action task force (FATF) to define economic offenders.
On the sidelines of G20, PM Modi also met a number of world leaders including Chinese President Xi for the fourth time and invited South African President Cyril Ramaphosa for 2019 Republic Day.
Foreign Secretary Vijay Gokhale said, "PM Modi extended South Africa Pres Cyril Ramaphosa invitation to be chief guest for India's Republic Day in 2019 and Ramaphosa accepted."
India will be celebrating the 150th birth anniversary of Mahatma Gandhi in 2019. A number of programmes have been organised by India to celebrate the anniversary.
