Kuala Lumpur, Feb 23: India today asked the non-aligned countries to press harder for reforms of the international financial institutions and collectively fight against those provisions of trips and WTO agreements which impede `our development efforts.` Addressing the first-ever NAM Business Forum meeting here, Prime Minister Atal Bihari Vajpayee also called for de-politicising regional economic cooperation and making it immune to bilateral issues. Ahead of tomorrow`s NAM Summit, Vajpayee said re-making of the movement lies in articulating a strong development agenda and at the core of this should be "our demand for a reform and reorientation of globalization."
"We should press harder for reform of the international financial architecture. Volatile capital flows must be checked. Resource flows to poor countries should be accelerated...International institutional conditionalities that have frequently slowed down economic recovery rather than speeding it up, should be reviewed," he said.
"A more participatory evaluation system based on cooperative engagement between lending and borrowing countries should be established, Vajpayee told the forum which was addressed among others by Malaysian Prime Minister Mahathir Mohammed, South African President Thabo M Mbeki and Indonesian President Megawati Sukarnoputri.
He said NAM countries "should harmonise their positions and pool resources to prevent unilateral action that denies market access to developing countries, fight against those provisions of trips and other WTO agreements which impede our development efforts."
Bureau Report