Ministers from the Group of Seven will huddle in Washington on Monday to discuss rare earths, raw materials that China controls and have become a focal point of President Donald Trump’s foreign policy.
Several finance ministers, including those from G7 nations, will convene on Monday to discuss rare earths, said a spokesperson for the Treasury Department, who declined to offer further details. The G7 includes the U.S., U.K., Canada, France, Germany, Italy and Japan.
The meeting arrives amid a blitz of policy developments across the globe, including a growing spat between Beijing and Japan that revolves around rare earths and Tokyo on high alert.
China’s Ministry of Commerce said it would ban the export to Japan of all “dual-use” items with potential military applications, citing national security concerns, according to The New York Times. The official announcement, issued Tuesday, was vague on specific commodities, but government-affiliated media said Beijing was considering whether to include certain rare earths among the items it was restricting.
