Obama Names Madeleine Albright As One Of The Representatives To G20 Economic Summit

Washington, D.C. (AHN) - President-elect Barack Obama on Wednesday announced that former secretary of State Madeleine Albright and former Iowa Republican Rep. Jim Leach will represent him and Vice President-elect Joe Biden during the global economic summit this weekend.

President George W. Bush is hosting the summit of G20 leaders in Washington this Friday and Saturday. The G20 is a group of twenty nations formed in 1999, after the last global financial crisis. The conference is planned as the first of a series "address[ing] the current crisis and to seek agreement on principles of reform needed to avoid a repetition and assure global prosperity in the future," the White House said last month.

In a statement on Wednesday, the president-elect's transition team said Albright and Leach "will seek input from visiting delegations" and then brief Biden and Obama.

"President Bush should be commended for calling the summit. There is one President at a time in the United States, so the President-elect has asked Secretary Albright and Congressman Leach, an experienced and bipartisan team, to be available meet with and listen to our friends and allies on his behalf," Obama senior foreign policy advisor Denis McDonough also said.

Albright served as secretary of State and the U.S. Ambassador to the United Nations during the Clinton administration.

Leach chaired the chaired the House Banking and Financial Services Committee, the Subcommittee on Asian and Pacific Affairs, and the Congressional-Executive Commission on China during his three decades as Iowa congressman. During the general election campaign, he endorsed Obama and was part of the group "Republicans for Obama."