39th G8 summit

39th G8 summit
39th G8 summit official logo
Host country	United Kingdom
Date	17–18 June 2013
Venue(s)	Lough Erne Resort in County Fermanagh, Northern Ireland
Follows	38th G8 summit
Precedes	40th G7 summit

The 39th G8 summit was held on 17–18 June 2013, at the Lough Erne Resort, a five-star hotel and golf resort on the shore of Lough Erne in County Fermanagh, Northern Ireland, United Kingdom. It was the sixth G8 summit to be held in the United Kingdom and the first to be held in Northern Ireland. The earlier G8 summits hosted by the United Kingdom were held in London (1977, 1984, 1991), Birmingham (1998) and Gleneagles (2005).

The official theme of the summit was tax evasion and transparency. However, the Syrian civil war dominated the discussions. A seven-point plan on Syria was agreed after much debate. Other agreements included a way to automate the sharing of tax information, new rules for mining companies, and a pledge to end payments for kidnap victim releases. The United States and the European Union agreed to begin talks towards a broad trade agreement.

The Group of Six (G6), started in 1975, was an unofficial forum which brought together the heads of the richest industrialized countries: France, Germany, Italy, Japan, the United Kingdom and the United States. This select few became the Group of Seven (G7) starting in 1976 when Canada joined. The Group of Eight was formed with the addition of Russia in 1997. 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 Germany's Chancellor Helmut Schmidt as they conceived the initial summit of the Group of Six in 1975.