Task for the week: limit the fallout from biggest oil shock in decades

The IMF headquarters in Washington. This week’s meetings take place at institutions to promote global cooperation, in the capital of the go-it-alone nation. Photograph: Gent Shkullaku/Zuma/Rex

The world’s finance ministers and central bank governors gather in Washington this week for the half-yearly meetings of the International Monetary Fund and the World Bank, with the global economy in a perilous spot.

Not since the foundation of the Bretton Woods institutions late in the second world war have global conflicts triggered this much economic turbulence. The volatile 1970s come close. But the US-Israeli war on Iran, coming so soon after the Covid pandemic and Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, take the prize.