May 11, 2002	Saturday	Safar 27, 1423

UNITED NATIONS, May 10: Debt relief for the poorest countries should be speeded up as part of a “new deal” in which they fight corruption in return for more trade and aid from rich nations, Britain’s finance minister said on Friday.

“I suggest a new development compact grounded in new rights and new responsibilities — where no country genuinely committed to good governance, poverty reduction and economic development should be denied the chance to achieve the 2015 goals through lack of resources,” Chancellor of the Exchequer Gordon Brown told a U.N. summit on children.

The goals he referred to were set by the United Nations at its 2000 millennium summit and call for halving world poverty, cutting child mortality by a third and providing universal primary education by 2015.

Under Brown’s plan for a “new deal for the global economy,” developing countries would pursue corruption-free policies to foster stability and investment, in return for steps by wealthy nations to drop trade barriers and increase spending on development aid.

If all nations, including those in conflict, become part of the World Bank’s debt relief program for the most heavily indebted poor countries, $100 billion in debt could be canceled, he said.

Rich countries would need to contribute an additional $1 billion to fully finance the program, Brown said.

He also urged wealthy nations to support poor countries facing legal challenges from creditors unwilling to provide debt relief.

“We particularly condemn the perversity where ‘vulture funds’ purchase debt at a reduced price and make a profit from suing the debtor country to recover the full amount owed — a morally outrageous outcome,” Brown said.

He encouraged the international community to provide technical and financial advice to heavily indebted poor countries being sued by vulture funds.

Brown also predicted a resolution soon of a long-running battle over replenishing the coffers of the International Development Association, the World Bank’s lowest-cost financing arm.

London and Washington have been squabbling since last year over the World Bank’s request for $12.5 billion in extra cash for the IDA, with the US proposing that more of the money be given out in the form of grants rather than loans.—Reuters