Top economic policymakers from many of the world’s wealthiest nations begin two days of meetings on Monday in Asheville, N.C., at an incredibly challenging moment. Global inflation is high, growth is choked by war in the Middle East, and rising borrowing costs are straining government budgets.
But on the eve of the summit of finance ministers and central bankers from the Group of 20 nations, those questions were clouded by a series of controversies around participation, including whether the Trump administration would let Russia attend while refusing to allow South Africa’s delegation to join.
The meeting opened on Monday morning with the Russian finance minister, Anton Siluanov, in attendance for the first time since Russia invaded Ukraine in 2022.
His presence was not announced publicly by American officials before the summit. It came as President Vladimir V. Putin of Russia was set to join President Xi Jinping of China and President Masoud Pezeshkian of Iran at a summit in Kyrgyzstan. A Chinese representative was, as is typical, also in attendance at the G20 meeting.
Russia’s surprise appearance in Asheville created an awkward situation for the European leaders at the G20 who strongly back Ukraine in its war against Russia. They have worked to isolate Russia in the global economy and on the diplomatic stage, and they will not want to do anything in this meeting to suggest that has changed, at a moment in the war when Moscow has bombarded Kyiv relentlessly.
Europeans were also upset that representatives from South Africa, a longtime member of the G20 and Africa’s largest economy, were not invited by the Treasury Department to Asheville. President Trump announced last year, after skipping a G20 summit hosted by South Africa, that he would exclude the country from this year’s meetings, citing a false narrative that white South Africans were being indiscriminately killed and their land was being seized.
Administration officials invited a group of American business executives to meet with the government leaders, from industries including banking and cryptocurrency, in an effort to create networking opportunities between government officials with the private sector. They rebuffed requests to also include executives from other G20 countries. The moves have unsettled some attendees at the gathering.
As he welcomed his international counterparts to the summit, Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent said that the U.S. wanted to refocus the G20 on its original mission of accelerating global growth. He said that countries needed to work together restore global economic imbalances that are harming many nations.
“A durable global economy cannot rest on beggar thy neighbor acts that stifle fair, market based competition,” Mr. Bessent said.
The summit comes at a pivotal moment, with the International Monetary Fund projecting that global growth will slow this year and inflation will rise. The decision by the United States to attack Iran in February disrupted the flow of oil and pushed energy prices higher, darkening the outlook for a world economy that has been battered by wars and a pandemic in recent years.
Huddled in a North Carolina mountain resort, officials are expected to discuss ways to reinforce global supply chains for commodities such as critical minerals, opportunities to increase international investment, and strategies for reducing or restructuring debt. The conversations are taking place as the U.S. gross national debt just topped $40 trillion, creating anxiety among bondholders and raising fears about higher borrowing costs.
“Mounting fiscal pressures, as evidenced by rising bond yields, and a stalled disinflation process — they are sources of worries both for markets and for policymakers,” Kristalina Georgieva, managing director of the I.M.F., told reporters ahead of the meetings.
Those concerns have been especially evident in the United States. In recent weeks, Mr. Bessent initiated surprising interventions in global currency markets and in the U.S. bond market in an effort to contain rising borrowing costs. Those measures have so far been only modestly effective, and they have drawn pushback from the European Union, which has seen its own currency suffer as a result of some of Mr. Bessent’s machinations.
Global leaders also remain wary of the ongoing U.S.-Israeli war with Iran, which has driven up energy costs worldwide, disrupted supply chains and dragged on growth.
“Everyone must contribute to reducing the massive global uncertainties” affecting growth, Lars Klingbeil, the German vice chancellor and finance minister, told reporters before flying to the summit. “That is why we are pushing for an end to the war with Iran and open shipping lanes through the Strait of Hormuz.”
Unifying the G20 has been a challenge for the administration, as countries continue to cope with uncertainty surrounding President Trump’s trade policies and the steep tariffs that he has imposed on imports, along with fallout from the war.
American officials have asked allies to join their “Operation Economic Outcast” initiative, which aims to strangle the Iranian economy and resolve the conflict through economic sanctions. Mr. Bessent last week warned that countries that do not sever economic ties with Iran would also face U.S. sanctions.
A senior Treasury official said in a briefing ahead of the Asheville meetings that the Iran plans would feature prominently in the discussions. Mr. Bessent signaled last week that the United States would have limited patience for countries that maintain economic ties with Iran but that he hoped other countries would comply with the Trump administration’s demands to cut off Iran in order to avoid a broader global economic war.
“Why would I want to blow up the global financial system?” Mr. Bessent said.
In another controversy, the Treasury has denied press credentials for attending the meetings to certain U.S.-based reporters for The New York Times and The Wall Street Journal, along with correspondents for Bloomberg News from several countries.
Germany’s finance ministry intervened with the Treasury after it initially denied credentials to German-based reporters from The New York Times and Bloomberg, who planned to travel with Mr. Klingbeil to Asheville.
The ministry succeeded in securing a credential for the Times reporter, the newspaper’s Berlin bureau chief, but not the Bloomberg reporter.
A diplomatic official, speaking on condition of anonymity under a customary practice in the official’s home country, said German officials viewed the denial of credentials for Bloomberg, an international news agency, as unprecedented and unacceptable.
