G20 leaders endorse tax deal and pledge more vaccines for poor countries

The Irish government initially opposed the new rate but won a significant concession by having a reference to the new rate being “at least 15%” removed

U.S. President Joe Biden, second from left, and British Prime Minister Boris Johnson, left, share a word with Turkey's President Tayyip Erdogan, second from right, at the La Nuvola conference centre for the G20 summit in Rome, Saturday, October 30, 2021. Picture: Kevin Lamarque/Pool Photo via AP

Leaders of the world's 20 biggest economies endorsed on Saturday a global minimum tax aimed at stopping big business from hiding profits in tax havens, and also agreed to get more Covid vaccines to poorer nations.

Attending their first in-person summit in two years, G20 leaders broadly backed calls to extend debt relief for impoverished countries and pledged to vaccinate 70% of the world's population against Covid-19 by mid-2022.