MOSCOW (Pakistan Point News / Sputnik - 21st February, 2023) Japan will host a meeting of finance ministers and the chief of central banks of the G7 countries on the sidelines of the G20 summit in India's Bengaluru on February 23 to discuss their response to Russia's special military operation in Ukraine, Japanese Finance Minister Shunichi Suzuki said on Tuesday.
"We'd like to reaffirm G-7 solidarity in supporting Ukraine and maintaining our pressure on Russia and discuss the impact (of the special military operation) on the global economy," Suzuki told journalists after a cabinet meeting, as quoted by the Kyodo news agency.
The meeting is set to discuss financial assistance to Ukraine via a new World Bank-backed fund and achieve unanimity among the group's members on this subject. The participants are also expected to touch upon the issue of sanctions against Russia.
On Monday, Japanese Prime Minister Fumio Kishida pledged to provide Kiev with $5.5 billion in financial aid ahead of the upcoming first anniversary of the start of Russia's military operation in Ukraine.
Kishida noted that the G7 leaders would continue to be united on the Ukrainian crisis and would hold their G7 video summit, joined by Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy, on February 24, one year after Russia started its special military operation in Ukraine, according to the statement.
This year Japan is holding the G7 presidency. Its key summit will be the first one hosted by Kishida. The summit will take place over three days from May 19 in the city of Hiroshima, the prime minister's constituency, which was devastated by a US atomic bomb in August 1945, with Kishida planning to draw attention to the security issues surrounding nuclear weapons.
The meeting of finance ministers and central bankers of G20 member countries will be held in the Indian city of Bengaluru from February 23-25.
