The leaders of the world's major industrial democracies convened in Évian-les-Bains on the French shore of Lake Geneva on Monday for the opening of the 52nd G7 summit, a three-day meeting hosted by France that is set to be dominated by the freshly struck US-Iran framework, Russia's war on Ukraine and an escalating trade confrontation with China.
US President Donald Trump was among the last to arrive, telling reporters "everything is very nice" before entering the summit hotel without taking questions. Brazilian President Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva — invited as a guest alongside the leaders of India, Kenya, South Korea and Syria — was the first through the doors, followed by European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen, European Council President António Costa, British Prime Minister Keir Starmer, Italian Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni and Japanese Prime Minister Sanae Takaichi.
The summit's convivial opening was undercut within hours by a fresh tariff threat from Trump aimed squarely at the host nation. The president said he had warned French President Emmanuel Macron to scrap France's 3% digital services tax on large technology firms or face steep retaliation. "I asked him not to charge American companies, and if they do, I have no choice but to charge a 100% tariff on all champagnes and all wines coming out of France," Trump told the New York Post.
France introduced its digital levy in 2019, applying a 3% charge on revenue earned within the country by the largest technology companies — a group dominated by US firms including Alphabet, Amazon, Apple and Meta. Washington has long argued the tax unfairly singles out American businesses. French wine and spirits already face a 15% EU-wide US tariff, and exports to the United States fell nearly 16% in value last year to about €1.9 billion.
On Iran, the leaders arrived with a US-Iran agreement in hand but not yet signed. Trump has authorised an end to the US naval blockade of Iranian ports, with a formal signing expected Friday in Switzerland that would reopen the Strait of Hormuz. Von der Leyen struck a more cautious note, saying the European Union would lift its own sanctions on Tehran only after "real change on the ground."
The war in Ukraine pressed in from outside the summit perimeter. Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy, who had offered to meet Vladimir Putin and was rebuffed, demanded "a response from the G7 countries" after overnight Russian strikes on Kyiv killed civilians and set fire to an 11th-century cathedral. He pressed the leaders for tougher sanctions and additional air-defence support.
Von der Leyen used the gathering to call for "unity and coordination among the G7" against what she described as Chinese trade distortions, noting that 2025 was the first year on record in which all 27 EU member states ran a trade deficit with China. Artificial intelligence — its economic promise and its risks to children online — is slated for a working session later in the summit.
Évian, a spa town of about 9,000 best known for its bottled water, last hosted a G8 summit in 2003. Swiss and French authorities have deployed thousands of police across the frontier region, closing most of the road crossings between the two countries, while tens of thousands of anti-G7 demonstrators massed across the lake in Geneva.