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| CBK calls for fairplay in global trade talks
President Chandrika Bandaranaike Kumaratunga has called for global trade talks to be renegotiated on more equitable principles and for conditions linked to aid to be scrapped if large sections of the world's population are to be pulled out of poverty. Giving a keynote speech at last week's World Economic Forum in Singapore she said: "Debt forgiveness will have to be adopted as international financial policy, if huge sections of the world population are to exist at all. "The principles that underly decisions on trade must definitely be the same for the developed and developing nations," she told a gathering of top business and political leaders at the East Asia Economic Summit organised by the World Economic Forum on Tuesday. "Policies regarding subsidies and competitive markets must be the same for all states," she said in her address to the session 'Focus on South Asia'. The summit, held on October 12-14 had as its theme the topic "Asia's future: Recapturing dynamism". Kumaratunga was sharply critical of the global trade movement, calling for an overhaul of the World Trade Organization and its agenda, saying: "Globalisation should not mean the continuous hegemony of the rich nations imposed upon the poorer nations. "Globalisation should be managed in a manner where the developing nations would have the space and the freedom to become partners of the globalised economy, while their specific needs and their rights to make their own economic policy choices is recognised." She condemned the world's developed nations for attempting to impose inequitable terms on poorer nations like Sri Lanka. "We do not comprehend how rich nations demand that we abandon to the whims of the global markets while vulnerable sectors of our economy such as the farmers and small industrialists practise extensive projectionist policies for these sectors in their countries," she said. Kumaratunga dismissed the "formulae dished out by various international organisations" and called for the adoption of debt forgiveness, saying conditions on aid should be replaced with "selective assistance to countries with a proven track record of success." She began her address by summing up South Asia's potential, noting that the region is home to a quarter of the world's population and that it represents a vast single market and pool of highly skilled labour. The region's enduring poverty, she said, was in part the result of the very history that provides its richness. Diverse and ancient civilizations, she said, had planted the seeds of inherent conflict, with some groups trying to redress perceived injustices through terrorism. While stipulating that terrorism could not be condoned, she said peace would require eliminating the injustices that inspired the terrorists in the first place. "The challenge of the 21st century for South Asia," she said, "is to honestly undertake that enterprise of building pluralist, multi-ethnic and multicultural nation states, by managing the existing diversities within our nations and directing the richness of this diversity towards positive change." Kumaratunga expressed hope that growing trade links with India and the rest of the subcontinent would position Sri Lanka as a services hub for the region. In particular, she cited the South Asian Association for Regional Co-operation (SAARC) as a catalyst for building such links. Political disputes have kept SAARC from progressing as far as South-East Asia has in adopting a vision of an integrated economic community, she said. But Sri Lanka has had a free trade agreement with India since 1998, which has boosted investment in a wide range of Sri Lankan industries, from petroleum and information technology to telecommunications and tourism. Tourism holds particular promise for Sri Lanka, she said as the island offers visitors virtually everything a tourist could want except snow. |
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