Despite not being on the G-20 agenda the crisis in Ukraine hung heavy over the gathering of leaders from key developing and industrial countries Saturday.

With the meeting in its second and final day, President Obama talked Asia Pacific cooperation and Ukraine with the Australian and Japanese leaders. The leaders called on Russia to stop meddling in Ukraine. They expressed unity "in opposing Russia's purported annexation of Crimea and its actions to destabilize Eastern Ukraine."

They also called for "bringing to justice those responsible for the downing Malaysian flight 17" last July. Thirty-eight Australians were among the 298 people killed when the Malaysian airliner was shot down over war torn Eastern Ukraine.

Russia's Vladimir Putin is present at the summit but keeping a relatively low profile.

British Prime Minister David Cameron on Saturday met with Putin, telling him that Russia has two choices: either implement the Minsk cease fire and withdrawal agreement, or persist with destabilizing Ukraine and face the prospect of further economic sanctions.

Obama is meeting the five European Union leaders present in Brisbane to discuss Ukraine and possible new sanctions.

Putin told a German interviewer that the sanctions are harmful to the world economy and to Russia, and run counter to what the G-20 is trying to do to boost global growth.

Leaders of the BRICS — Brazil, Russia, India, China and South Africa — also met on the sidelines of the Brisbane summit. A short statement issued afterwards made no mention of Ukraine.

The BRICS leaders — who have agreed to share their currency reserves and are setting up an infrastructure development bank— called on the United States to ratify long-delayed International Monetary Fund reforms which give greater voice to BRICS nations. The US, with the largest share of IMF votes, is the only country that has not yet approved the 2010 reforms.

Australian finance minister Joe Hockey says economic matters continue to be the central challenge for the G-20. "We can't rest," he said, "the world needs growth." Hockey said climate change and other issues should not overshadow what he called the real work of the summit.


USA today

The world's most powerful political and economic leaders have reached a rare unanimous agreement at the Group of 20 summit in Brisbane, Australia.

The consensus — koalas are adorable.

Australian Prime Minister Tony Abbott greeted the illustrious G-20 attendees before the start of the summit with Jimelung the koala and an as yet unnamed companion, resulting in what may be the most joyful opening to an international economic summit in recent history.

Everyone from President Obama to IMF chief Christine Lagarde cracked child-like grins in the presence of the cuddly marsupials. Even the usually stoic Russian President Vladimir Putin — who is being widely criticized for his country's actions in eastern Ukraine — beamed as he hugged a wide-eyed koala






USA TODAY

Under pressure to jolt the lethargic world economy back to life, leaders of G-20 nations on Sunday finalized a plan to boost global GDP by more than $2 trillion over five years. The fanfare, however, was overshadowed by tensions between Russian president Vladimir Putin and Western leaders.

The communique from the Brisbane summit of Group of 20 wealthy and emerging nations revealed that the plan for jumpstarting growth includes investing in infrastructure, increasing trade and the creation of a global infrastructure hub that would help match potential investors with projects.

Leaders also aim to reduce the gap between male and female participation in the workforce by 25 percent by 2025, saying that would put 100 million more women in employment and reduce poverty.

Speaking at the end of the summit, Australia's Prime Minister Tony Abbott said countries will hold each other to account by monitoring implementation of their commitments to boost growth.

The G-20, criticized in recent years as being all talk and no action, was urged to deliver measurable results this year. Perhaps in response, the group said the International Monetary Fund and OECD will also play a role in monitoring progress and estimating the economic benefits of the growth plan.

IMF managing director Christine Lagarde dismissed concerns that countries might fudge their growth figures, saying that while the monitoring isn't scientific, it's a thorough and detailed process.

"We'll make sure they keep their feet to the fire," she said.

The G-20 communique says if the $2 trillion initiative is fully implemented, it would lift global GDP by 2.1 percent above expected levels by 2018 and create millions of jobs.

Abbott said countries agreed on more than 800 new measures to spur the global economy, which the IMF describes as facing a "new mediocre."

"People right around the world are going to be better off," he said.

But the G-20, which represents around 85 percent of the global economy, faces an uphill struggle to implement its plan after international agencies downgraded their global growth forecasts in recent months. Growth in China and Japan has weakened and Europe is teetering on the brink of another recession.

And experts warned that the countries would need to comply with every one of the 800 measures to achieve the 2.1 percent target, a virtually impossible task, given the difficulties they will inevitably face in pushing some of the policies through in their home countries.

"There are two questions: whether the specifics are credible and whether the political backing by leaders is convincing," said Thomas Bernes, an analyst with the Center for International Governance Innovation, a Canadian-based think-thank.

Abbott said the group had been most productive on the issue of trade, calling it the "key driver of growth." The leaders adopted reforms to streamline customs procedures and reduce regulatory burdens.

Despite Australia's push to keep the summit focused on the economy, the meeting was largely overshadowed by tensions between Putin and Western leaders over the escalating conflict in Ukraine, where Moscow is supporting pro-Russian rebels in the country's east.

Putin was the first leader to depart Australia, leaving before the communique was issued. He told reporters he left ahead of a final leaders' lunch because he wanted to rest before returning to work.

Abbott has been particularly strong-worded in his criticism of Russia since a Malaysia Airlines plane was shot down in July over a part of eastern Ukraine controlled by Russian-backed separatists, killing all 298 on board. Australia lost 38 citizens and residents in the MH 17 disaster.

Abbott said he and Putin had engaged in a "very robust" discussion about the situation in Ukraine.

"I utterly deplore what seems to be happening in eastern Ukraine," Abbott said. "I demand that Russia fully cooperate with the investigation, the criminal investigation of the downing of MH17, one of the most terrible atrocities of recent times."

The G-20 also tackled the tricky issue of tax evasion by multinationals, declaring that profits should be taxed in the country where they are earned. There has been an ongoing effort by governments to crack down on the practice of big companies such as Google and Amazon moving profits earned in one country to others with lower tax rates.

The G-20 endorsed a common reporting standard for the automatic exchange of tax information, which will begin by 2017 or 2018.

Rights groups' reactions to the communique were relatively positive. Oxfam said it was happy the leaders tackled tax evasion, but called for a global tax summit where all countries would have a say in deciding fair tax rules.

Tim Costello, chair of the Civil Society 20 group, or C-20, was relieved the communique specified that the beneficiaries of the additional growth would include the poor.

"We've taken a few small steps forward," he said. "Inclusive growth, which really requires the benefits to flow to jobs and to the poor and to women, is in the text, rather than flowing to profits and the top 5 percent."

Thousands took part in more than two dozen protests throughout the weekend, but only a handful of arrests were reported. Tensions briefly flared on Sunday when Aboriginal rights activists burned an Australian flag, but police didn't intervene.

AP

Australia's prime minister vowed that world leaders would deliver on an initiative to add $2 trillion to global GDP, promising freer trade and more investment in infrastructure as heads of the 20 largest economies began cementing plans to drag sagging growth out of the doldrums.

Prime Minister Tony Abbott, who has repeatedly promised this year's Group of 20 gathering in the Australian city of Brisbane would be more than a talkfest, said the growth plans would add millions of jobs and boost global GDP by "more than 2 percent" above expected levels over the next five years.

"That is millions of jobs and trillions of dollars in extra production," Abbott said as he officially opened the two-day G-20 conference. "Yes, we want freer trade and we will deliver it. Yes, we need more infrastructure and we will build it."

"This is our message to the world: that governments can deliver, that governments can agree that the world can be better, that there can be higher jobs, higher growth and more jobs," he added.

G-20 nations, which represent 85 percent of the global economy, are under pressure to take definitive action at this year's summit, rather than simply producing a set of vague, unmeasurable goals. The International Monetary Fund has warned about a "new mediocre" for the world economy, putting renewed focus on the G-20's growth initiative.

Each country is expected to present a comprehensive plan at the summit on how they will achieve their contribution toward the $2 trillion goal, but whether the communique that will be issued at the conclusion of the gathering on Sunday will reveal any of those details is unclear. World GDP this year is about $77 trillion.

Australian Treasurer Joe Hockey said the group's growth strategies include 1,000 measures that will lift infrastructure investment, increase trade and competition, cut red tape and increase employment.

"While we still face economic challenges in many parts of the world, I'm optimistic our 2 percent commitment will deliver the growth the world needs," Hockey said.

But rights groups such as The Civil Society 20 group, or C20, want assurances that the poor will benefit the most from the plans, estimating that the additional growth could lift 1 billion people out of poverty if it was poured into the poorest 20 percent of G-20 households.

Before intensive talks could begin, however, leaders took time to enjoy a traditional Aussie barbecue at the state Parliament House, feasting on king prawns, oysters, lamb and pavlova, a popular meringue dessert generally served with fruit and whipped cream.

Several of the leaders' spouses visited a wildlife sanctuary where they cuddled with koalas and fed kangaroos.

Dignitaries were greeted by a traditional Aboriginal welcome ceremony, featuring singing, dancing and the solemn hum of a didgeridoo, before entering their first official closed-door meeting.

The leaders later issued a statement on the Ebola crisis in West Africa, urging countries that haven't donated to efforts to combat the disease to do so now, and to send medical teams. The group also said researchers, regulators and drug companies needed to work harder to develop vaccines and treatments.

Outside the convention center where the summit is taking place, thousands of protesters braved a scorching heat wave and a labyrinth of roadblocks to stage rallies demanding everything from action on climate change to banning Russian President Vladimir Putin from the gathering.

The protests have been largely peaceful, with only a handful of arrests. An Associated Press photojournalist saw police take two gas masks and a pocket knife out of two activists' bags before escorting them away. Knives and gas masks are on a lengthy list of banned items in the city this weekend; prohibited items also include eggs, guns, kites and reptiles.

Six thousand police officers were on duty to maintain order, many dumping bottles of water on themselves to cope with temperatures that are expected to reach 40 degrees Celsius (104 Fahrenheit) on Sunday.

Tax avoidance by big, multinational companies was expected to be high on the agenda, particularly in light of the recent leak of documents suggesting that hundreds of big companies such as Pepsi and IKEA had organized tax-lowering deals with Luxembourg.

The tiny European nation's neighbors reacted angrily to the news, noting that they have had to impose harsh austerity measures on their own citizens to keep government budgets afloat following the global recession.

On Saturday, Jean-Claude Juncker, two weeks into his new job as European Commission president, faced tough questioning about his tax record as prime minister of Luxembourg for 18 years.

During a news conference on the sidelines of the G-20, he was grilled about whether Luxembourg was guilty of "picking people's pockets" while he was the nation's leader, and asked whether he could be considered a credible representative of the European Union on the issue of tax avoidance, given his ties to Luxembourg.

Juncker largely deflected the questions.


AP

(Reuters) - Financial leaders of the Group of 20 top economies remain committed to chasing higher global growth, but were divided on how to achieve it as Germany pushed back at calls from the United States and others for more immediate stimulus.

Opening a meeting of G20 finance ministers and central bankers, Australian Treasurer Joe Hockey outlined on Saturday an ambitious agenda of boosting world growth, fireproofing the global banking system and closing tax loopholes for giant multinationals.

"We have the opportunity to change the destiny of the global economy," said Hockey, who back in February launched a campaign to add 2 percentage points to world growth by 2018 as part of Australia's presidency of the G20.

That goal has seemed ever more distant as members from China to Japan, Germany and Russia have all stumbled in recent months. Just this week, the Organisation for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD) slashed its growth forecasts for most major economies.

U.S. Treasury Secretary Jack Lew called for the euro zone and Japan to do more to boost demand and revive activity, signaling out Germany as having scope to do much more thanks to its burgeoning trade surplus.

Berlin was none too pleased.

"We will not agree on short-sighted stimuli," a German G20 delegate said, arguing that in most countries debt was still too high to allow for increased spending.

Germany has been under intense pressure to allow the euro zone to ease back on fiscal austerity and to boost its own economy through more government spending or tax cuts.

More than 900 individual growth proposals had been submitted and analyzed by officials, said Canadian Finance Minister Joe Oliver, the co-head of a G20 working group on growth. "We believe that these actions in total - and if implemented, and that is key - would come very close to 2 percent," he told Reuters.

French Finance Minister Michel Sapin was certainly putting the accent on near-term stimulus.

"I want to repeat and say again that the immediate concern with the shorter term is very much expressed," he said was his message to his G20 colleagues. "The immediate concern is really to recover growth while global growth in 2014 is still subdued."

GEOPOLITICS A THORN

The outlook for activity has not been helped by geopolitical tensions, from fighting in the Middle East to the strife between Russia and Ukraine.

Hockey said Australia, as the G20 host this year, had sought feedback from other G20 members on whether Russia should attend the meeting of leaders in Brisbane in November.

There had been calls from some quarters to block President Vladimir Putin from attending the summit given Russia's actions in Ukraine and the downing of airliner MH17.

The overwhelming consensus was that the door be left open to continue engagement with Russia, said Hockey.

Geopolitical tensions were also high on the agenda when financial policymakers of Japan, China and South Korea held their first trilateral meeting in more than two years in Cairns on Friday.

Another risk discussed was the Ebola epidemic as Sierra Leone began a three-day lockdown to try and stem the disease.

World Bank Group President Jim Yong Kim on Friday warned of the economic danger if fear of the disease caused consumers and travelers to change their behavior.

So serious was the situation, he said, that the United Nations was taking a leading role. Sources indicated the G20 communique on Sunday would include the need for international cooperation in fighting the outbreak.

"The (UN) Secretary General is handling Ebola as if it were sort of an outbreak of war, where instead of sending peacekeeping troops, we're going to send in people who are going to be battling Ebola," Kim said.

TAX TROUBLES

Also on the drawing board at the G20 are plans to stem the loss of revenue from multinationals shifting their profits to low-tax countries, potentially reclaiming billions of dollars.

Taxation arrangements of global companies such as Google Inc, Apple Inc and Amazon.com Inc have become a hot political topic following media and parliamentary investigations into how many companies reduce their bills.

The OECD has unveiled a series of measures that, if implemented by members, could stop companies from employing many commonly used practices to shift profits into low-tax centers.

Since countries began targeting cross-border loopholes five years ago, an additional 37 billion euros ($47.5 billion) in tax had been recovered, OECD Secretary-General Angel Gurria said, adding that firms were estimated to be holding $2 trillion in low- or no-tax countries.

"The whole world needs to go after tax cheats," Hockey said about the measures, which he hopes will be adopted by at least 44 countries.