EVIAN-LES-BAINS — Fresh off celebrations marking his 80th birthday, U.S. President Donald Trump is heading to France for a G7 summit expected to focus on some of the most divisive issues facing the world’s leading democracies, including Iran, Ukraine and trade.
The meeting, taking place from late Monday through Wednesday, brings Trump together with allies at a moment when tensions on several fronts have strained relations within the group.
Just hours before departing Washington, Trump announced an agreement to end the war, a development that could significantly reshape the tone of the talks in Evian-les-Bains.
Only days earlier, the summit had appeared likely to unfold under far more turbulent circumstances. With the Iran-U.S. ceasefire looking increasingly fragile and strikes resuming, expectations were growing that the gathering on the shores of Europe’s largest Alpine lake could be marked by confrontation and diplomatic strain.
That uncertainty fueled speculation among analysts that tempers might flare during the summit and that Trump could even cut his stay short in the tightly secured Alpine spa town. Evian-les-Bains has been placed under heavy security as it welcomes G7 leaders along with additional guests invited by French President Emmanuel Macron, this year’s host.
The Group of Seven includes France, the United States, Canada, Germany, Italy, Japan and the United Kingdom.
Summit outcomes could depend on Trump’s mood
Shared values and interests, leaders’ personal chemistry and the informality of G7 gatherings — the club first came together in 1975 to brainstorm fixes for the ailing global economy — have facilitated discussion at previous meetings.
“Many of the great G7 summit initiatives have come from leaders’ spontaneous combustion, created by them on the spot, based on free, unrestricted dialogue about the values, memories and even the sports, like baseball, that they share,” said John Kirton, a G7 specialist at the University of Toronto.
But Trump’s relationships with European allies have been fraught even before he launched the Iran war with Israel in February without consulting them. The Evian gathering is their first get-together since then.
Allies that Trump berated for refusing to join the war are likely to greet any Iran deal with relief if it reopens the Strait of Hormuz and enables Persian Gulf energy exports to flow freely again.
Ukraine wants to make its case to Trump
As host, Macron has packed the meatiest and potentially most contentious topics into the summit’s first 24 hours, including the Iran war and its impact on energy supplies and the Ukraine war that’s largely slipped down the White House’s list of top priorities.
Tuesday’s morning session on Ukraine will afford invited guest President Volodymyr Zelenskyy an opportunity to showcase progress that Ukrainian forces are making against the Russian invasion. If Zelenskyy is able to convince Trump that Russian President Vladimir Putin cannot achieve his aims in the war militarily, he might perhaps also be able to persuade him that Putin should be pushed to the negotiating table.
After his Oval Office thrashing by Trump and Vice President JD Vance last year, Zelenskyy now has “a significantly stronger hand,” said Maria Snegovaya, a Russia expert at the Center for Strategic and International Studies, a Washington, D.C., think tank.
The Trump administration “does tend to look more favorably at those states that have certain positions of power tilting in their favor,” she said.
Outlook uncertain for talks on Iran
A lunch meeting Tuesday on the Middle East could go any number of ways. The U.S.-Iran deal is expected to be signed on Friday, followed by technical talks on details over the next 60 days. Trump will be pressed for more information about the terms of the agreement.
If it reopens the Strait of Hormuz, France and Britain are expected to make the case that they could help rid the narrow waterway of any mines and escort tankers through it. They have been working on such plans with other nations but have been waiting for a stable ceasefire to launch the mission.
G7 leaders are also expected to talk about developing other energy supply routes out of the Gulf, including via Egypt. The Egyptian president, Abdel-Fattah el-Sissi, as well as Qatar’s ruling emir and the United Arab Emirates’ president will join those talks. Trump is also meeting with each of those regional leaders privately during the summit.
A dense agenda of other issues
China, not a G7 member, is expected to be a focus of economic talks on Wednesday. G7 nations are concerned that China is flooding export markets with subsidized products, unfairly out-competing their own industries and destroying jobs. China’s economy dwarfs those of all G7 nations except the United States.
Discussions are also scheduled on artificial intelligence, including how to protect young people online, and how to economically aid developing countries.
Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi and Brazil’s President Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva are attending some of the summit. So, too, are the leaders of South Korea and Kenya.
The G7 has been a force for more than 50 years
The G7 countries take turns hosting and organizing activities. France inherited the G7 presidency from Canada, last year’s summit host, and will pass it to the U.S. in 2027.
The club’s first summit, in Rambouillet, France, in 1975, brought together the leaders of six nations — France, West Germany, Italy, Japan, the U.K. and the U.S. — for brainstorming on how to speed their recovery from the sharpest economic slump since World War II. Canada joined the following year, making the G7.
No G7 leader has ever skipped an annual summit, a perfect attendance record for more than 50 years, said Kirton, the University of Toronto specialist.
Membership has always been limited to democracies, enabling Russia to join as a fledgling democracy in 1998 but ruling out Communist Party-ruled China.
The club has broken off with Russia since 2014, when Putin seized Crimea from Ukraine, foreshadowing the full-scale war now raging since 2022.
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Associated Press writers Jamey Keaten in Geneva and Sylvie Corbet in Paris contributed.
