AFP USA

US President Donald Trump vowed Wednesday to end Sudan’s grinding civil war at the request of Saudi Arabia’s crown prince, condemning “tremendous atrocities” in a conflict he has previously overlooked.Trump admitted that the devastating war between Sudan’s army and the paramilitary Rapid Support Forces (RSF) was “not on my charts” before Prince Mohammed bin Salman pushed him to get involved.But Trump said he would now work to “stabilize” the conflict with regional powers, notably including the United Arab Emirates, which denies accusations of backing the RSF with weapons and mercenaries.The United Nations has repeatedly called for greater global attention to the war, which has killed tens of thousands of people and displaced nearly 12 million since its outbreak in April 2023.”His majesty would like me to do something very powerful having to do with Sudan,” Trump said at a business forum with the Saudi royal a day after Prince Mohammed received a lavish reception at the White House.”It was not on my charts to be involved in, I thought it was just something that was crazy and out of control. But I just see how important that is to you, and to a lot of your friends in the room, Sudan. And we’re going to start working on Sudan.”Sudan’s Saudi-backed sovereign council, which is headed by army chief Abdel Fattah al-Burhan, said it was ready to cooperate with the United States and Riyadh.In a statement, the council thanked Washington and Riyadh for “their continued efforts to stop Sudanese bloodshed.”International attention on the conflict has increased since the RSF recently seized the key Darfur city of El-Fasher after a relentless siege that has sparked warnings of crimes against humanity and genocide.- ‘Immediate halt’ -Trump had barely commented on the Sudan war in the nine months since he returned to office, focusing instead on the wars in Gaza and Ukraine.But on Wednesday, the 79-year-old Republican said he would use the “influence of the presidency to bring an immediate halt” to the war.”Tremendous atrocities are taking place in Sudan. It has become the most violent place on Earth,” Trump said on his Truth Social network a few hours after his initial comments.”We will work with Saudi Arabia, United Arab Emirates, Egypt, and other Middle Eastern partners to get these atrocities to end, while at the same time stabilizing Sudan.”While the conflict has been off Trump’s radar, Washington has stepped up efforts in recent months to resolve it.US Secretary of State Marco Rubio called the UAE’s foreign minister on Friday to urge Abu Dhabi to back a Sudan ceasefire.Trump’s own Africa envoy Massad Boulos on Saturday told AFP that the war in Sudan was the “world’s biggest humanitarian crisis.”Trump repeatedly claims to have solved eight conflicts since returning to office in January as he seeks a Nobel Peace Prize.His promise to start working on the Sudan conflict reflects his close ties with the de facto Saudi leader, whom he hosted at the White House for a lavish visit on Tuesday.Their closeness was also underscored by his comments in the Oval Office on Tuesday, during which Trump defended the prince over the 2018 murder of Washington Post journalist Jamal Khashoggi, saying the prince “knew nothing”.

Many US Federal Reserve officials were leaning against another rate cut in December, meeting minutes showed Wednesday, a move sure to infuriate President Donald Trump as he pushes for lower rates.The minutes come amid heightened uncertainty surrounding the economic outlook, with policymakers recognizing risks to the jobs market and concerns that inflation could be more persistent than expected — even after the impact from Trump’s tariffs fade.”Many participants suggested that, under their economic outlooks, it would likely be appropriate to keep the target range unchanged for the rest of the year,” said the minutes of the October 28-29 gathering.At the meeting, Fed officials voted to make a second straight interest rate cut this year, bringing the benchmark lending rate to a range between 3.75-4.0 percent.But Fed Chair Jerome Powell said shortly after unveiling the decision last month that a further reduction in December was “not a foregone conclusion.”Any decision to keep rates steady is likely to anger Trump, who said Wednesday he would “love to fire” Powell and urged Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent to “work on” the central bank chief.According to the minutes released Wednesday, “participants expressed strongly differing views about what policy decision would most likely be appropriate” in December.While “most participants” found that further rate cuts would likely be appropriate over time, several indicated they did not necessarily view another 25 basis point reduction as the best choice for the upcoming meeting.Many officials agreed that the rate-setting committee should be “deliberate in its policy decisions,” partially also because there is less availability of key economic data.A record-long government shutdown from October to mid-November paused the release of government economic reports — including those on inflation — leaving policymakers and business in a fog as they gauge the state of the world’s biggest economy.”These minutes underline that the FOMC (Federal Open Market Committee) remains far more divided than usual on the next steps,” said Oliver Allen of Pantheon Macroeconomics. But he expects the Fed to continue easing policy over time.For now, many officials expect a further uptick in underlying goods inflation over the coming quarters as Trump’s tariffs bite.But the timing and magnitude remains unclear as businesses take time to adjust prices.When it comes to the labor market, officials generally expect conditions to “soften gradually” in the coming months, with firms reluctant to hire or lay off workers.Many Fed officials are also noticing “a divergence in spending patterns across income groups,” the report said.They noted that consumption growth appeared to be disproportionately supported by households with higher incomes that benefit from strong equity markets.Lower-income households are increasingly sensitive to prices, and are adjusting their spending in response to higher costs and economic uncertainty.In October, 10 of 12 voting members on the FOMC supported lowering rates by 25 basis points.Of the two who disagreed, Fed Governor Stephen Miran backed a larger 50 basis point cut and Kansas City Fed President Jeffrey Schmid supported keeping rates unchanged instead.

Saudi Arabia has lifted a travel ban on a US citizen who criticized the kingdom on social media, his family said Wednesday, as President Donald Trump welcomed the crown prince.Saad Ibrahim Almadi, a US citizen of Saudi origin, had been arrested during a visit to his native country in 2021 after tweets that mentioned corruption and the killing of Jamal Khashoggi, a dissident writer strangled and dismembered in a Saudi consulate.He was sentenced to 16 years in prison in 2022, in part on charges of destabilizing the kingdom. He was released a year later after appeals from the United States under president Joe Biden but prevented from leaving the country.His family said that Saudi authorities have now lifted a travel ban and that Almadi was on his way back to the United States.”This day would not have been possible without President Donald Trump and the tireless efforts of his administration,” the family said in a statement.”We hope the support and care we received will continue for those still held hostage in Saudi Arabia and in other parts of the world.”Trump on Tuesday laid out a red carpet for Saudi Arabia’s crown prince and de facto ruler, Mohammed bin Salman, who US intelligence said ordered the killing of Khashoggi, a US resident who wrote opinion pieces in The Washington Post.Trump defended the crown prince, saying that he “knew nothing” about the murder and that “things happen,” and snapped at a journalist who he said embarrassed the Saudi prince by asking about it.Crown Prince Mohammed, who pledged a $1 trillion investment in the United States, said Khashoggi’s murder was “painful” and a “huge mistake.”During Trump’s first term, vice president Mike Pence publicly urged Saudi Arabia to free Raif Badawi, a rights activist serving a 10-year prison sentence and publicly lashed 50 times for his blog postings.Badawi served out his sentence and remains banned from leaving Saudi Arabia.

Conservative delegations from the Vatican to Iran are pushing to narrow the definition of “gender” at UN climate talks in Brazil — a move aimed at excluding trans and non-binary people and threatening to complicate the summit’s outcome.The effort, which seeks to use footnotes of key texts to attach country-specific interpretations, would set a “harmful precedent” that could seep into other shared decisions taken by the UN’s climate body, opponents warn. “When women and gender-diverse people are at the table, climate policies are more ambitious, more inclusive and more durable,” former Irish president Mary Robinson said Wednesday.”Weakening agreed language undermines climate ambition and is completely new in this system and it’s not acceptable.”Paraguay, Argentina, Iran, Indonesia, Malaysia as well as the Holy See have so far entered footnotes into the draft Gender Action Plan (GAP) meant to guide work for the next decade, including efforts to embed gender in the heart of climate programs.Similar footnotes have also appeared in a text related to the “just transition” — the framework to shift to environmentally sustainable economies without leaving workers and communities behind.”We do not agree at all with what some countries are putting in the agenda footnotes,” Alicia Barcena, Mexico’s secretary of environment, told AFP.”We feel we are going backwards — we should never go backwards.”The issue has become so sensitive that COP30’s Brazilian presidency has elevated it from technical negotiations to a higher political level, where ministers are now trying to hash out a compromise.Women and girls face disproportionate impacts from climate change, the UN says, largely because they make up the majority of the world’s poor, and are less involved in decision-making.During times of drought they walk further, work harder, and are more likely to die than men when extreme weather disasters strike.Yet despite decades of commitments, women account for just 35 percent of delegates at COP30 in Belem, according to the Women’s Environment and Development Organization (WEDO).The first formal GAP was adopted in 2017 and strengthened in 2019; COP30 is now hammering out its next, more ambitious iteration.- Anti-wokeism -The footnotes lay bare parties’ red lines around the term “gender” — some longstanding, others part of a rising right-wing tide opposed to so-called “wokeism.”The Holy See, for example, says it understands gender as “grounded on the biological sexual identity that is male and female.”Argentina, a majority-Catholic country led by President Javier Milei — a close ally of US President Donald Trump — has rolled back gender-equality policies and LGBT rights, and attacked the “cancer” of “wokeism.”There is “frustration within rooms,” a source close to the matter, who requested anonymity because they were not authorized to discuss the sensitive issue, said Wednesday. “It’s become a bit ridiculous — we have six footnotes right now; should we have 90?”The source added there was no need to reopen the definition, because parties can already interpret decisions according to their national circumstances.”Allowing countries to attach their own interpretations to agreed language does not protect national sovereignty. It undermines multilateralism itself,” Bridget Burns, executive director of the Women’s Environment and Development Organization, told AFP.”If every Party could footnote core terms like finance, ambition or equity, we would have no negotiation left — only fragmentation. Gender equality is an agreed principle under this Convention — it needs no qualification.”One possible off-ramp, the source said, would be for the opposing countries to deliver statements after a decision is adopted, ensuring their positions are reflected in the official record.

US President Donald Trump vowed Wednesday to end Sudan’s grinding civil war at the request of Saudi Arabia’s crown prince, condemning “tremendous atrocities” in a conflict he has previously overlooked.Trump admitted that the devastating civil war between Sudan’s army and the paramilitary Rapid Support Forces (RSF) was “not on my charts” before de facto Saudi leader Mohammed bin Salman pushed him to get involved.But Trump said he would now work to “stabilize” the conflict with regional powers, notably including the United Arab Emirates, which denies accusations of backing the RSF with weapons and mercenaries.The United Nations has repeatedly called for greater global attention to the war, which has killed tens of thousands of people and displaced nearly 12 million since its outbreak in April 2023.”His majesty would like me to do something very powerful having to do with Sudan,” Trump said at a business forum with the Saudi royal a day after Prince Mohammed received a lavish reception at the White House.”It was not on my charts to be involved in, I thought it was just something that was crazy and out of control. But I just see how important that is to you, and to a lot of your friends in the room, Sudan. And we’re going to start working on Sudan.”Shortly afterward Trump, who had barely commented on the Sudan war in the nine months since he returned to office, was talking about the conflict again on social media.The 79-year-old Republican said he would use the “influence of the presidency to bring an immediate halt” to the war.”Tremendous atrocities are taking place in Sudan. It has become the most violent place on Earth and, likewise, the single biggest Humanitarian Crisis,” Trump said on his Truth Social network.- ‘Gone bad’ -Trump called Sudan a “Great Civilization and Culture, unfortunately gone bad” that could be fixed with the help of wealthy regional powers.”We will work with Saudi Arabia, United Arab Emirates, Egypt, and other Middle Eastern partners to get these atrocities to end, while at the same time stabilizing Sudan,” he added.Saudi Arabia supports Sudan’s army-aligned government. The army accuses the United Arab Emirates of backing the RSF, which the UAE denies.The RSF recently seized the key city of Al-Fasher after a relentless siege, leading the UN Human Rights Council on Friday to order a probe of alleged atrocities. Despite the conflict being off Trump’s radar, Washington has stepped up efforts in recent months to finalize a truce between the warring parties.US Secretary of State Marco Rubio called the UAE’s foreign minister on Friday to urge Abu Dhabi to back a Sudan ceasefire.And Trump’s own Africa envoy Massad Boulos on Saturday told AFP that the war in Sudan was the “world’s biggest humanitarian crisis.”Trump repeatedly claims to have solved eight conflicts since returning to office in January but has until now focused instead on the wars in Gaza and Ukraine in his pursuit of a Nobel Peace Prize.His promise to start working on the Sudan conflict reflects his close ties with the de facto Saudi leader, whom he hosted at the White House for a lavish visit on Tuesday.Their closeness was also underscored by his comments in the Oval Office on Tuesday, during which Trump defended the prince over the 2018 murder of Washington Post journalist Jamal Khashoggi, saying the prince “knew nothing”.

Brazilian President Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva hit the corridors of COP30 in Belem on Wednesday, in a push to land a deal at the UN climate talks as nations remained divided over contentious issues.Lula flew into the Amazonian city to bring the weight of the presidency to the talks, in a rare late-stage visit by a head of state or government at the annual gathering.COP30 host Brazil released a draft pact on Tuesday and pushed negotiators to work through the night, hoping to get nations to agree on the most disputed points as soon as Wednesday — two days before the conference is scheduled to end.Lula, who has invested political capital into making what he dubbed the “COP of truth” a success, shuttled between rooms to meet with ministers of various negotiating groups.”His willingness to make time in his busy schedule to give new momentum to the COP is tremendously important,” EU climate commissioner Wopke Hoekstra said in a statement after meeting with Lula.But as the day progressed, a deal had yet to materialize.The disagreements center on the impact of trade measures, language on transitioning away from fossil fuels, and demands for developed countries to provide more climate finance to poorer nations.French ecological transition minister Monique Barbut knocked back Brazilian hopes of securing a deal as soon as Wednesday.”No, there will not be a COP decision today. I don’t see how that could happen,” Barbut told AFP.”However, yes, there is a little bit of movement. But we are still far from the mark because for us, it must be a comprehensive package,” Barbut said after a coordination meeting with European colleagues.She added, however, that she was “more optimistic” than she was the day before.- No more money -The draft underscores the gulf between a broad coalition of more than 80 countries pushing for a “roadmap” on phasing out fossil fuels and an opposing bloc led by oil-producing countries.”Whether we’re going to call it the roadmap or we’re going to use a different wording, I think is secondary. But once again, we very much like the idea,” Hoekstra said at a news conference.Further complicating matters, there are visible cracks on the Brazilians’ front.The idea of a roadmap, pushed by Lula himself, was never taken up by the summit’s president — led by diplomats who are seen by observers as close to business circles, and under pressure from nations that do not want it brought up.Negotiators are also at loggerheads over pressure from the developing world for developed countries to provide more finance to help vulnerable nations adapt to climate change and deploy renewable energy.The COP29 summit in Baku last year concluded with developed nations agreeing to provide $300 billion a year in climate finance, a figure criticized by developing countries as woefully insufficient.The EU, where many countries are facing economic headwinds and soaring debt, has led opposition to demands for more money.”We’re not looking at any increases in adaptation finance,” Irish climate minister Darragh O’Brien said.The EU is also fighting any attempt to have language against its tax on imports of carbon-intensive goods such as steel, aluminum, cement and fertilizers.China has called for the removal of what it calls “trade barriers.””There should be at least a mention (of trade measures), because they become a disabler instead of an enabler. So, I think they will be mentioned in some way,” Mexican environment minister Alicia Barcena told AFP.A new text is expected to be published on Wednesday.COP30 is due to end on Friday, but climate summits regularly run into overtime.In a sign that Brazil wants to stay on schedule, delegates sleeping on two cruise ships serving as floating hotels have been told to vacate their cabins on Saturday morning.

Seven people linked to a Canadian former Olympic snowboarder turned alleged drug kingpin have been arrested in Canada, including his lawyer, officials said Wednesday.Ryan Wedding, 44, who is believed to be hiding out in Mexico, is wanted by the United States on drug and murder charges and is on the FBI’s “Ten Most Wanted Fugitives” list.The State Department announced on Wednesday that it was increasing the reward for information leading to Wedding’s arrest to $15 million from $10 million.FBI Director Kash Patel described Wedding at a press conference in Washington as a “modern day iteration of Pablo Escobar,” the notorious Colombian drug lord who died in 1993.”(Wedding) is responsible for engineering a narco-trafficking and narco-terrorism program that we have not seen in a long time,” Patel said.US and Canadian officials said seven people connected to Wedding’s cocaine smuggling operation were arrested in Canada on Tuesday, including his lawyer, Deepak Paradkar, and the United States was seeking their extradition.Paradkar, 62, of Ontario, allegedly told Wedding that if he killed a witness in a pending criminal case against him the case would go away.”His lawyer told him, ‘If you kill this witness, the case would be dismissed,'” Assistant US Attorney Bill Essayli said.The witness was shot five times in the head and killed in January 2025 at a restaurant in Medellin, Colombia, Essayli said.Also arrested in Canada was Gursewak Singh Bal, 31, of Ontario, founder of a website known as “The Dirty News.”Bal was allegedly paid to post a photograph of the slain witness on the website “so that the victim could be located and killed,” the Justice Department said.Michael Duheme, commissioner of the Royal Canadian Mounted Police, said the arrests were part of a coordinated law enforcement action dubbed “Operation Giant Slalom.”Wedding competed for Canada in snowboarding at the 2002 Salt Lake City Olympics, finishing 24th in the parallel giant slalom.”Fugitive Ryan Wedding remains one of the top threats to Canadian public safety,” Duheme said.Wedding, whose aliases include “El Jefe,” “Giant” and “Public Enemy,” is accused of shipping hundreds of millions of dollars of cocaine from Colombia through Mexico to the United States and Canada.FBI agent Akil Davis said Wedding is being protected by the Sinaloa Cartel in Mexico and is “extremely dangerous.””He’s extremely violent and he’s extremely wealthy,” Davis said.In addition to the seven Canadians arrested on Tuesday, three other people linked to the January 2025 murder of the witness in Colombia were taken into custody, officials said.

US President Donald Trump fiercely defended Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman Tuesday over the 2018 killing of journalist Jamal Khashoggi, insisting the kingdom’s de facto ruler “knew nothing” about the murder as he wooed him at the White House.Trump sought to brush the gruesome murder of the Washington Post columnist under the red carpet, honoring the Saudi royal with a flypast and lavish dinner, and formally naming Riyadh as a major non-NATO ally.He raged at a journalist who asked the prince in the Oval Office about the case for embarrassing the Saudi royal on his first US trip since the murder, and called Khashoggi “extremely controversial.””A lot of people didn’t like that gentleman that you’re talking about,” he said.”Whether you like him or didn’t like him, things happen, but he (the prince) knew nothing about it. And we can leave it at that. You don’t have to embarrass our guest by asking a question like that.”The Saudi royal, who came bearing a pledge of a $1 trillion investment in the United States on his first US visit since the killing, said Khashoggi’s murder was “painful” and a “huge mistake.”Trump’s comments were at odds with a US intelligence assessment in 2021 that concluded Prince Mohammed had ordered the operation to kill Khashoggi, who was murdered and dismembered inside the Saudi consulate in Istanbul.Saudi officials blamed rogue agents.- ‘No justification’ -After the meeting, the journalist’s widow, Hanan Elatr Khashoggi, said in a post on X there was “no justification to murder my husband” and urged the Saudi prince to “meet me, apologize and compensate me.”The killing during Trump’s first term caused a diplomatic crisis, but the US president made it clear he now wanted to paper over it as he boosts his relationship with the Saudis.Trump called for US broadcaster ABC, whose journalist asked the question about Khashoggi’s murder, to have its license revoked in a furious diatribe against the “crappy” company.In a surprise move at the gala dinner in the evening, Trump said he was designating Saudi Arabia as one of just 20 major non-NATO allies around the world. “I’m just telling you now for the first time, because they wanted to keep a little secret for tonight,” he said.Soccer legend Cristiano Ronaldo, who plays in Saudi Arabia, was among the guests at the meal. So was billionaire Elon Musk, in a sign that the billionaire has mended ties with Trump after his tempestuous spell in the president’s administration.Earlier Trump, 79, pulled out all the stops to impress Prince Mohammed, 40, giving him a flyby featuring the coveted, US-made F-35 stealth fighters, and thundering cannon fire.The flattery continued inside the Oval Office, as Trump called the Saudi a “very good friend” and hailed him as being “incredible, in terms of human rights, and everything else.” The two countries later signed a host of deals, including a civil nuclear cooperation agreement that the White House said would last decades.Trump also approved a “major defense sale package” which includes “future deliveries” of F-35s. They also agreed to share AI technology “while protecting US technology from foreign influence.”- Business interests -Trump said he had also pushed Prince Mohammed to normalize relations with Israel through the Abraham Accords, as he seeks to turn the fragile ceasefire between Israel and Hamas in Gaza into a longer-lasting regional peace.The Saudi said he wanted to join the accords — Trump’s signature diplomatic achievement during his first term — but first needed a “clear path” to Palestinian statehood.Prince Mohammed has fostered close ties with Trump and his family over the years, including through investment pledges to the property billionaire-turned-US president.Trump denied any conflicts of interest, a day after a Saudi developer announced a new hotel partnership in the Maldives with the Trump Organization, which is run by his sons.”I have nothing to do with the family business. I have left,” Trump said.

A portrait by Austrian artist Gustav Klimt fetched $236.4 million in New York on Tuesday, becoming the second most expensive artwork ever sold at auction. Six bidders battled for 20 minutes over the “Portrait of Elisabeth Lederer,” which Klimt painted between 1914 and 1916. The piece depicts the daughter of Klimt’s main patron dressed in a white imperial Chinese dress, standing before a blue tapestry with Asian-inspired motifs. Sotheby’s, which managed the sale, did not disclose the identity of the buyer. The most expensive painting ever sold at auction remains the “Salvator Mundi,” attributed to Leonardo da Vinci, which was bought for $450 million in 2017. “Full-length society portraits of this impressive scale and from Klimt’s pinnacle period (1912-17) are exceptionally rare; the majority in major museum collections,” Sotheby’s said of Tuesday’s sale. “The painting offered this evening was one of only two such commissioned portraits remaining in private hands,” it added in a statement. Several other works from Klimt were auctioned at the same event, including “Flowering Meadow” for $86 million and “Forest Slope at Unterach am Attersee” for $68.3 million — both part of the collection of Estee Lauder cosmetics heir Leonard Lauder, who died earlier this year. In total, 24 lots from the Lauder collection generated $527.5 million.For Klimt, the past auction record for his work was held by “Lady with a Fan,” which sold for 85.3 million pounds ($108.8 million) in London in 2023. Another notable auction on Tuesday saw Italian provocateur Maurizio Cattelan’s solid gold toilet go for $12.1 million, and was sold to a famous American brand, according to Sotheby’s.An earlier version of the luxe latrine, titled “America,” was stolen in 2019 from a castle in England. Though it was never recovered — and likely was melted down for cash — three men were convicted in connection with the theft.On Thursday, a self-portrait by Frida Kahlo has a chance of setting a record for a female artist when it goes on sale, also at Sotheby’s in New York. Estimated at $40 to $60 million, the 1940 piece called “The Dream (The Bed)” shows the Mexican painter sleeping in a bed overshadowed by a large skeleton. The most expensive painting by a female artist sold to date is a 1932 work by American Georgia O’Keeffe, which fetched $44.4 million in 2014. The record for Frida Kahlo is another self-portrait from 1949, “Diego and I,” which sold for $34.4 million in New York. 

South Africa will host the G20 summit this weekend, aiming to secure commitments on debt relief for developing countries and to tackle global inequalities as the United States boycotts the event.US President Donald Trump, who has clashed with South Africa over its G20 agenda, is skipping the summit amid a wider US retreat from multilateralism that has rattled global order.President Cyril Ramaphosa told reporters ahead of the November 22-23 event that the US absence is “their loss”.The United States is the most powerful of the 19 countries in the G20, which represents 85 percent of global GDP and about two-thirds of the world’s population, and also includes the European Union and the African Union.The US boycott echoes Trump’s decision not to send an official delegation to the COP30 summit in Brazil.The Republican leader has also withdrawn from the Paris Agreement, an international treaty to limit global warming and has imposed unilateral tariffs on a host of trading partners.South Africa, in particular, has been slapped with a 30 percent tariff from the United States.Trump has also singled out the sub-Saharan nation over a number of issues since he returned to the White House in January, notably claiming falsely that white Afrikaners were being systematically “killed and slaughtered” in the country.- Debt, disaster financing -South Africa’s G20 theme of “Solidarity, Equality, Sustainability” focuses on supporting developing countries through debt relief and financing measures to cope with disasters caused by climate change.It was branded “anti-American” by US Secretary of State Marco Rubio in February, when he skipped one of the first meetings of G20 ministers.South Africa says debt is a priority because repayments limit investments in essentials such as infrastructure, healthcare and education.Between 2021 and 2023, Africa spent $70 per capita on debt interest payments, more than on education or health which were at $63 and $44 per capita respectively, according to the United Nations.Ramaphosa will also push for the creation of an “International Inequalities Panel”, modelled after the IPCC for climate change, to tackle massive global inequality that is particularly stark than in South Africa.A report for the G20 from a team led by Nobel laureate economist Joseph Stiglitz labelled wealth inequality as a global crisis that threatens democracy and social cohesion, saying it should be confronted with the same urgency as the climate crisis.”If adopted, it would mark a significant win not just for Pretoria’s presidency, but for the millions across the Global South whose voices are often sidelined in elite economic forums,” said Tendai Mbanje, a researcher at the the University of Pretoria’s Centre for Human Rights.- Consensus? -It is unclear if South Africa’s G20 presidency will manage to secure a consensus and release a joint final declaration on the issues discussed.Delegates involved in preparatory work said Argentina’s representatives have been obstructive. President Javier Milei — a Trump ally — is also boycotting the event.In the absence of the United States, China’s representative Premier Li Qiang is expected to advocate for multilateralism.”Economic globalisation and multipolarity are irreversible,” Li said at a Asian regional summit in October.Russia will be represented by President Vladimir Putin’s economic advisor and deputy chief of staff, Maxim Oreshkin, in the notable absence of Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov.The summit is set to begin the day after the scheduled conclusion of COP30 in Belem, Brazil, whose final negotiations could influence discussions in Johannesburg.It marks the end of a cycle of G20 presidencies by Global South countries, following Indonesia in 2022, India in 2023 and Brazil in 2024.The next to take the baton is the United States.Washington has already announced its intention to narrow the G20’s focus to issues of economic cooperation at the December 2026 meeting to be held at a Miami golf course owned by the Trump family.