A GROUP of current and former world leaders has called for an urgent G20 summit on coronavirus to be convened.

A joint letter from 225 past and present world leaders, economists and health experts calls for a £2 trillion plan to support the fight against Covid-19 and stimulate the global economy.

The G20, a forum for nations and the EU to discuss economic matters, is not currently due to meet until November. The letter says quicker action is needed to prevent an even deeper worldwide recession and health crisis.

Poorer countries are the most at risk, the letter says.

It calls for 76 nations to be released from debt payments, a doubling of the World Bank’s emergency aid fund and £5.6 billion towards vaccines.

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The letter, whose signatories include former UK prime ministers Gordon Brown, Tony Blair and John Major, says: “Without action from the G20, the recession caused by the pandemic will only deepen, hurting all economies and the world’s most marginalised and poorest peoples and nations the most.

“Representing, as it does, 85% of the world’s nominal GDP, the G20 has the capacity to lead the mobilisation of resources on the scale required. We urge leaders to do so immediately.”

The letter also calls for global co-operation around the development of vaccines “to ensure that they are universally and freely available as quickly as possible.”

Action against tax havens should also be taken, it says, with sanctions issued against countries which breach the rules.

The former leaders say nations “should be willing to go beyond their normal fiscal deficit ceilings,” borrowing more money to avert a long-term crisis. Brown, who chaired the G20 summit in 2009, said: “As our letter states the world is at a critical moment.

“Without a G20 leaders meeting online soon, and certainly long before the end of November, a vacuum in global leadership will open up just at the time when we need global action most.”