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Russia’s return to G8 impossible if West portrays it as reward for good behavior — expert

However, Andrei Kortunov believes that Russia should continue its work with the G7

MOSCOW, August 24. /TASS/. The Russian leadership will not agree to return to the G8 format if its Western partners portray the move as a reward for ‘good behavior,’ Director General of the Russian International Affairs Council Andrei Kortunov said on Friday.

"Speaking about turning the Group of Seven into the Group of Eight, our Western partners portray this as a kind of bonus, a kind of reward to encourage Russia’s good behavior and spur the domestic policy changes that they want. Naturally, this approach is not going to work," the prominent Russian political expert said during a roundtable to discuss the possible rapprochement between Russia and the Group of Seven (G7).

According to Kortunov, the G7 is a largely symbolic structure.

"There is a big question of who really needs who," he said, adding that Russia’s participation in the discussion is crucial for solving many issues, which the G7 is now facing. "This should certainly be taken into account. They need to realize that the G7 membership is not a reward and not a bonus, and treating it in this manner does not seem productive. I don’t think the Russian leadership is ready for that," the expert said.

However, Kortunov believes that Russia should continue its work with the G7.

"If [US President Donald] Trump invites [Russian President Vladimir] Putin to visit the G7 summit in the United States next year, this invitation should be considered with due seriousness, because this will be an opportunity to articulate our stance and, possibly, to have important bilateral meetings on the sidelines of the Group of Seven," he continued. "However, I don’t think that there is a serious possibility of Russia’s return to the G8 format in the foreseeable future."

Kortunov said that the G7 group has undergone through serious changes, including when some of G7’s important functions were delegated to G20.

US President Donald Trump told reporters on Tuesday that "it’s much more appropriate to have Russia in" [the G8]. According to a senior US administration official cited by CNN, Trump and his French counterpart Emmanuel Macron agreed in a telephone conversation that the Russian president should be invited to the G7 summit in 2020. According to CNN, Trump plans to broach the topic at the upcoming G7 summit.

The G7 is a group of industrialized nations that includes Canada, France, Germany, Italy, Japan, the United Kingdom and the United States. The group was renamed the G8 in 1997 when Russia joined the club. However, following the 2014 events in Ukraine that created a crisis in relations between Russia and the West, the group’s western members decided to revert to the G7 model.

On August 21, Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov said that Moscow was ready to consider initiatives concerning the revival of the G8 platform if the G7 countries put any forward. Kremlin Spokesman Dmitry Peskov, in turn, told reporters on August 22 that returning to the G8 was not a goal in itself for Russia particularly because the G20 platform provided more opportunities for resolving various issues. However, he pointed to Putin’s statements about Moscow’s readiness to communicate with other countries on any platform.

This year’s G7 summit is scheduled to take place in Biarritz, northwestern France, on August 24-26.