Group of Seven Plans to Meet Before Summit

The world’s top economic policy-makers have agreed that they need to meet before next month’s summit of their bosses and plan to get together in New York on Sunday, Canadian officials said Tuesday.

The Group of Seven leading industrial nations has tentatively accepted a U.S. invitation to hold its meeting of finance ministers and central bank governors in New York, before their annual meeting.

The summit of government heads, including President Bush, is scheduled for July 15-17.

Topping the agenda of the industrial nations probably will be how much help to give the crumbling Soviet economy, how to pull Western nations out of recession and what to do about the dollar’s surge.

The pre-summit meeting, if convened, probably would be held for only one day, an official said. The talks would group the economic decision makers of the United States, Japan, Germany, France, Britain, Italy and Canada.

“Everyone agrees on New York,” one senior official said. Canada had offered to host the meeting, but New York was considered a more convenient venue.

“The latest talk is (for) Sunday,” the official added.

The discussions would be designed to tackle some of the issues on the long agenda set for the July summit in London, at which aid to the Soviet Union will be a priority.

Soviet President Mikhail S. Gorbachev has been invited to London at the time of the summit to plead his case for Western help for his economic reforms.