UPDATE 2-Developing nations blast West for failed aid promises

Sat Oct 11, 2008 7:56am IST
 
Email | Print | | Single Page
[-] Text [+]

(Recasts with details from news conference)

By Lesley Wroughton

WASHINGTON, Oct 10 (Reuters) - Developing countries said on Friday they could fall victim to the global credit crunch that began in the West and blasted industrial nations for not living up to promises for aid.

The Group of 24, which brings together developing and large emerging countries from Africa, Asia, Latin America and the Middle East, said the world economy faced its most difficult situation in years.

"Developed countries have the means to deal with the problem, but we who are developing countries, or emerging countries, could collapse under the weight of such a crisis," G24 chairman Jean-Claude Masangu Mulongo, governor of the central bank of the Democratic Republic of Congo, told reporters.

"Our banking systems could come really crashing down."

They also called on the International Monetary Fund to monitor the policies of Western economies more closely.

The grouping includes Egypt, India, Iran, Argentina, Brazil, Mexico, the Philippines, Pakistan, South Africa, Syria, Venezuela, Algeria, Peru and smaller economies like Ghana, Gabon and Trinidad & Tobago. China is a G24 observer.

Mulongo said the United States had come up with a $700 billion rescue package in a week, yet it could not make good on promises of increased aid from a poverty summit in 2005.  Continued...

REUTERS COLUMNS

Photo
Obama and India

Columnist K. Subrahmanyam says Indian optimism about Barack Obama is justified as the President-elect calls for redoubling Indo-US military, intelligence and law enforcement cooperation.  Column