G20 summit to be held in Toronto

Next year’s summit of the Group of 20 developed and developing nations will be held in Toronto on June 26 and 27, Canadian Prime Minister Stephen Harper said on Monday.

Mr. Harper also said Canada would co-chair a planned G20 summit in November in South Korea. South Korean officials had said previously that Seoul would run that meeting.

Canada will also chair the smaller Group of Eight summit next year. The G8 summit will be held immediately before the G20 meetings, on June 25 and 26 in the resort town of Huntsville, Ontario, about 200 kilometres north of Toronto, the government said.

Some in the more influential G20 had wanted the larger summit to go first and thus capture more of the spotlight, but those trying to salvage a continuing role for the G8 appear to have won out.

The last G8 summit, which U.S. President Barack Obama hosted in Pittsburgh in September, decided to shift the main focus for economic decisionmaking from the G8 to the G20, which includes heavyweights China, India and Brazil.

The G8 comprises the United States, Britain, France, Germany, Italy, Japan, Russia and Canada.

Before the G20’s ascendancy, Canada had announced the G8 summit would be in Huntsville from June 25-27, but when a G20 meeting was added on, it became clear Huntsville was too small.