30th G8 summit

30th G8 Summit
30th G8 Summit official logo
Host country	United States
Dates	June 8–10, 2004
Follows	29th G8 summit
Precedes	31st G8 summit

The 30th G8 summit was held in Sea Island, Georgia, United States, on June 8–10, 2004.

The Group of Seven (G7) was an unofficial forum that brought together the heads of the richest industrialized countries: France, Germany, Italy, Japan, the United Kingdom, the United States, and Canada starting in 1976. The G8, meeting for the first time in 1997, was formed with the addition of Russia. In addition, the president of the European Commission has been formally included in summits since 1981. The summits were not meant to be linked formally with wider international institutions; and in fact, a mild rebellion against the stiff formality of other international meetings was a part of the genesis of cooperation between France's President Giscard d'Estaing and West Germany's Chancellor Helmut Schmidt as they conceived the initial summit of the Group of Six (G6) in 1975.

The G8 summits during the 21st-century have inspired widespread debates, protests and demonstrations; and the two- or three-day event becomes more than the sum of its parts, elevating the participants, the issues and the venue as focal points for anarchists, anticapitalists and domestic terrorists.

The G8 is an unofficial annual forum for the leaders of Canada, the European Commission, France, Germany, Italy, Japan, Russia, the United Kingdom and the United States.

The 30th G8 summit was the first summit for Canadian Prime Minister Paul Martin.