From the prime minister’s view, if you look at the Syrian conflict thus far, we are talking about something around 93,000 people having lost their lives, about the use of chemical weapons – these are unacceptable things and it is important therefore …
• President Obama and President Putin are preparing for crunch talks this evening over the civil war in Syria. According to one report, Putin, the Russian president, is going to insist on four conditions for a Geneva peace summit taking place, including Iran being represented and Bashar al-Assad being recognised as the legitimate ruler of Syria. Earlier David Cameron, the British prime minister and the host of the G8 summit, said Russia must join the west in seeking a democratic transition from the autocratic government of Bashar al-Assad, “so that people in Syria can have a government that represents them, rather than a government that’s trying to butcher them.”
Let’s be clear – I am as worried as anybody else about elements of the Syrian opposition, who are extremists, who support terrorism and who are a great danger to our world. The question is what do we do about it? My argument is that we shouldn’t accept that the only alternative to Assad is terrorism and violence. We should be on the side of Syrians who want a democratic and peaceful future for their country and one without the man who is currently using chemical weapons against them. What we can try and do here at the G8 is have further pressure for the peace conference and the transition that is needed to bring this conflict to an end.
William Hague, the British foreign secretary, said that Syria was “the worst human tragedy of our times” and that the situation was getting worse. But in Moscow the Russian government said it would not allow the US and its allies to set up a no-fly zone over Syria. “I think we fundamentally would not allow this scenario,” foreign ministry spokesman Alexander Lukashevich said. At the G8 summit Stephen Harper, the Canadian prime minister, said that Russia’s stance would prevent an agreement.
We are not, unless there is a big shift in position on [Putin's] part, going to get a common position with him at the G8.
• Britain’s ambassador in Turkey has been summoned to the foreign ministry in Ankara to hear protests following the revelation in the Guardian that Britain spied on foreign governments attending the G20 summits in London in 2009.”If these allegations are true, this is going to be scandalous for the UK,” a foreign ministry spokesman said. “At a time when international co-operation depends on mutual trust, respect and transparency, such behaviour by an allied country is unacceptable.” Cameron and Number 10 have refused to comment on the revelations, saying they do not comment on intelligence matters (although, as David Lowry, a reader, reminded me in an email, William Hague delivered an entire Commons statement on intelligence matters following the revelations about the links between GCHQ and the US National Security Agency’s Prism programme. ) See 12.52pm.)
• Barack Obama has said the Northern Ireland peace process is the “blueprint” for other conflicts to be solved across the planet. As Henry McDonald reports, the US president called for an end to sectarian divisions in schools, workplaces, cities, towns and villages in the province in a speech in Belfast. Praising the peace process, Obama said:
Few conflicts seemed more intractable than the one here in Northern Ireland. When peace was achieved here it gave the whole world hope …
If you contine your courageous path to a perfect peace this will good for the world … We need you to get this right. You set an example for those who s eek a peace of their own among people gripped in conflict. They know something better is out there, to put aside the violence. They are studying what you are doing and wondering perhaps that if Northern Ireland can achieve peace then we can too. You are their blueprint to follow.”
* Obama and Cameron have made a joint visit to an integrated primary school in Enniskillen.
• Cameron has cited the opening of talks on an EU/US free trade deal, which is due to be formally announced this afternoon, as an example of the way summits like the G8 can be of real benefit to consumers. Downing Street said a deal could be finalised within 18 months and that it could be worth £10bn a year to the UK, or £380 a year to every household. Cameron said “hard-working families” would benefit.
I want to be absolutely clear that my agenda here is about helping hard-working families right here in the United Kingdom … We are going to achieve more on that. If we sign trade deals and start trade negotiations here at this meeting in Northern Ireland, that will cut prices and mean a wider range of goods in shops here in the United Kingdom and jobs here in the United Kingdom.
But Jose Manuel Barroso, the president of the European Commission, has angered French Socialists by depicting the French demand for an opt-out affecting the film and music industries as reactionary. (See 12.19pm.)
• Tax campaigners have claimed that developing countries could be excluded from the benefits of a tax transparency deal being thrashed out at the G8. The Enough Food For Everyone IF campaign said it had heard from diplomatic sources that a new standard on automatic exchange of information about corporate tax arrangements could be limited to rich countries. It said this in its news release.
The discussions are understood to focus on ‘reciprocity’ – whether developing countries must share the information they hold before they can access information themselves. While this sounds reasonable it is in fact being used as a barrier to keep developing countries out of any deal. Poor countries need this information to crack down on tax dodging.
Cameron said that, having persuaded UK overseas territories and crown dependencies to sign up to the new OECD standards, he had already made “huge progress” on this agenda. Stephen Harper, the Canadian prime minister, has said that Canada has no objections “in principle” to Cameron’s plan for a crackdown on tax havens. And Enda Kenny, the Irish prime minister, has also said that Ireland has “nothing to fear” from Cameron’s proposals.
• Michelle Obama has told schoolchildren in Belfast that young people make her optimistic about the future.
You have the freedom of an open mind, you have a fresh perspective that will help you find solutions to age-old problems …
I have never felt more optimistic. Time and again I have seen young people choosing to live together, choosing to lift each other up, choosing to leave behind the conflicts and prejudices of the past and create a bright future for us all.
For more details, visit www.guardian.co.uk
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