G7 leaders meeting kicks off in Italy with focus on Ukraine and Gaza

Italy's PM Giorgia Meloni has welcomed leaders of the world's seven richest nations at the G7 summit in Italy. Representatives from Canada, France, Germany, Italy, Japan, the UK and the US will discuss issues including the wars in Ukraine and Gaza, BBC reports.

The G7 summit will also involve leaders from Africa and the Indo-Pacific region, and will discuss economic co-operation with developing countries.

This year, the summit is expected to agree a plan to use frozen Russian assets to raise billions of dollars for Ukraine.

Since the start of the war in Ukraine in 2022, about $300bn worth of Russian assets have been frozen in Western countries. The whole money cannot be taken because of financial ramifications, but, according to BBC, this pot is generating a lot of interest - around $3bn a year - so their idea is to use that interest "in a creative way". The idea is to take out a loan on the international markets, give about $50bn to the Ukrainians each year, and use the $3bn to pay off the interest on that loan each year.