SAVAGE: US treasury secretary Scott Bessent said Australia and several other countries would join a meeting of finance ministers from the Group of Seven advanced economies that he is hosting in Washington on Monday to discuss critical minerals.
Bessent said he had been pressing for a separate meeting on the issue since last summer’s summit of G7 leaders, and finance ministers had already held a virtual meeting in December.
India was also invited to attend the meeting, Bessent told Reuters in an interview after touring the Minneapolis-area engineering lab of RV and boat maker Winnebago Industries. He said he was unsure if it had accepted the invitation.