Daily Press Cuttings

Friday 23rd June 2000

The Evening Standard: Jubilee 2000: Musicians and fans at this weekend's Glastonbury Festival will be stepping up the campaign to end Third World debt by promoting a mass e-mail petition to world leaders on the eve of the annual G8 meeting next month. Stars including David Bowie, Travis and the Pet Shop Boys will lead the final push being launched by Jubilee 2000 at the festival where 100 000 fans will start gathering tonight for three days of music. They hope to break the world record for the most signatures collected on one issue, now standing at 22 million supporting the reunification of North and South Korea.

The Economist: Global finance: Harvard Economist Jeffrey Sachs writes on globalisation. He says that today's world is divided not by ideology but by technology. This demands bold new thinking on development. The prosperity of the richest countries is at an all-time high, and so is their capacity to look beyond their own immediate needs. At the same time, the crisis of the poorest countries is acute, and the shortcomings of the current strategy of globalisation painfully evident. At the UN's Millennium Assembly later this year, the world's leaders will have a chance to will both the ends and the means for the kind of globalisation that can serve all the world. They must seize that chance.

The Guardian: Jubilee 2000: Article on the impact of religion on politics says that the mainly church-led campaign to write off third world debt has impressed UK government ministers. It helped to persuade Gordon Brown to cancel debts to Britain from the world's poorest countries. Aid: Japan, France and Denmark have scuppered an international agreement to loosen the strings attached to Third World aid donations by rich industrialised nations, prompting the UK government to accuse them of putting narrow financial interests ahead of effective development policies.

FT: Global finance: FT leader welcomes the naming and shaming by the intergovernmental Financial Action Task Force of 15 countries responsible for money-laundering. As well as the usual suspects, the Bahamas, the Cayman Islands and Liechtenstein, politically sensitive countries such as Russia, Israel and the Lebanon were also named. Zimbabwe: Morgan Tsvangirai, leader of Zimbabwe's opposition Movement for Democratic Change, yesterday accused the government of preparing to rig this weekend's general election in at least 20 of the 120 constituencies at stake to ensure victory for the ruling Zanu-PF party. Indonesia: The Indonesian central bank governor, Syarhil Sabirin, is to be charged for corruption relating to the Bank Bali scandal. World Bank: Letter from Stephen Hellinger of the Saprin civil society network, saying that World Bank prescribed structural adjustment policies, first implemented in the 1980s, have had a devastating effect on Latin American economies. Jubilee 2000: Observer diary piece comments on the fact that the UK Chancellor's mother Mrs Elizabeth Brown filled in one of the Jubilee 2000 cards and sent it to the Treasury, calling for the write-off of developing countries' debt.

The Independent: Colombia: Independent leader comments on the decision of the US Senate, which has just come out in favour of a $900 million package of anti-drugs aid for Colombia. The word “aid” is misleading. The package is about military spending, the last thing that Colombia now needs. Cambodia: Anger over appalling conditions in Cambodian factories producing clothes for Western firms including Gap and Fruit of the Loom spilt over on to the streets of Phnom Penh. UK/London: Picture of London mayor, Ken Livingstone, and Bob Geldof, whose 10 Alps company has been awarded a contract to stage a community event for the capital on New Year's Eve.

IHT: AIDS: The world-wide AIDS epidemic, long thought of as a city problem, is shifting fast to rural areas in the Third World, a report from UNAIDS and the UN Food and Agriculture Organisation said on Thursday.

The Daily Telegraph: UK: The UK government's debt burden plunged to its lowest level for seven years last month as the Treasury carried out its pledge to use the mobile phone windfall money to pay down debt.

Thursday 22nd June 2000

The Guardian: Development/Oxfam: Children in the world's poorest countries are dying at the rate of almost 200 an hour as a direct result of the failure of governments to fulfil their pledges to slash global poverty by 2015, the charity Oxfam will claim this week. Amid growing controversy over whether the fruits of globalisation are reaching impoverished nations, Oxfam is accusing politicians in both the north and the south of “criminal complacency” and “comprehensively reneging” on international development commitments made in Copenhagen five years ago. Its study found that child mortality was declining at less than half the rate needed to meet the target of cutting the number of child deaths by two-thirds by 2015. By then, 8.5 million children under 5 would be dying, compared with a target of 4.7 million. Kevin Watkins, Oxfam's senior policy adviser, said that there was no chance of hitting the 2015 targets unless there was redistribution in favour of the poor. He condemned the World Bank's “return to the trickle-down policies of the 1980s.” Nigeria: Nigeria's most populous northern state, Kano, adopted Islamic Sharia law yesterday but delayed its application until the Muslim holy month of Ramadan, in late November. Around 90 per cent of Kano's 8 million population are Muslim.

FT: Indonesia: Abdurrahman Wahid, Indonesian president, has raised his estimate of former president Suharto's personal wealth to $45 billion and says most of it will come to the Indonesian state. He was quoted yesterday by the official Antara news agency as saying he was optimistic that peaceful demonstrations by student activists woulsd frighten the 79-year-old Mr Suharto, a former general, into returning 95 per cent of his family fortune. Indonesia: Indonesia's central bank governor, Syahril Sabirin, was detained yesterday by authorities probing the attempted misuse of Bank Bali funds for political purposes. Oil: Leading oil exporters in OPEC last night agreed an output increase of 708 000 barrels a day, in a move expected to offer little relief to consumers struggling with a near trebling of oil prices over the past 18 months. Africa: Kenya's steep decline and Ethiopia's surprising resurgence are the two main features of the World Economic Forum's Africa Competitiveness Report published yesterday. The report compiled by the Harvard Institute for International Development in co-operation with the Geneva-based World Economic Forum, is the second of the series to be published. Professor Jeffrey Sachs, who masterminded the survey, said the main determinant of whether countries moved up or down the league table appeared to be politics. Nigeria, Malawi and Tanzania had moved up, whilst Kenya and Zimbabwe had moved down. Vietnam: Vietnam is conducting trials of securities trading this week in preparation for the launch of the communist country's first stock market. World Bank/economic growth: Letter from economist Jagdish Bhagwati arguing that economic growth is closely associated with poverty reduction, and the incomes going to the poor do, on average, rise proportionately to the growth of overall income.

The Independent: Zimbabwe: Intimidation of the opposition party MDC (Movement for Democratic Change) by the ruling Zanu-PF party has meant that canvassing has had to be carried out at night in the most hostile constituency Murehwa South. Independent leader argues that the elections this weekend mark the most important moment in Zimbabwe's history since independence. Sierra Leone/UK: Britain wants a firm commitment at the G8 summit in Okinawa to measures to stop trade in 'blood diamonds' and has persuaded the EU to freeze a £35m aid package for Liberia whose President, Charles Taylor is a backer of the rebel RUF.

Wednesday 21st June 2000

FT: World Bank: Martin Wolf comments on the fierce debate both within the World Bank and outside on the relative weight to be placed on “opportunity”—for which read economic liberalisation and growth—and “empowerment”—for which read redistribution of income and other interventions to assist the poor. The departure of Professor Kanbur, the economist responsible for the World Development Report, from the World Bank was because presumably he felt he was being asked to shift the emphasis too far towards the former. Nevertheless in the view of Mr Wolf the World Bank needs to place market-oriented growth at the heart of its strategy for elimination of mass poverty. He criticises Oxfam and other NGOs who seek to impose anti-growth policies on poor countries abroad, and argues that the Bank has to start from market-based growth. It has no acceptable alternative. Africa: UK foreign office minister Peter Hain says that Africa could replicate the success of Asia's tiger economies, but the west must do its bit to help. He calls on Africa's “lion” economies to step forward. Diamonds: South-African based diamond giant De Beers yesterday announced record rough diamond sales of $3.5 billion in the first half of this year. Inequality: The International Labour Office says that the percentage of GDP spent on social security rose in most countries between 1975 and 1992, but there was a decline in such expenditure during that period in Africa and Latin America.

New York Times: (yesterday's paper) US/Debt relief: Leader calls on Congress to meet the US administration's full request of funding for the HIPC initiative. Debt relief is crucial because poor countries use up to 60 percent of their government budgets to service debt on loans taken out decades ago that will never be repaid. But Congress is now likely to approve far less. Alabama's Sonny Callahan, a Republican, has recommended that his House Appropriations Subcommittee on Foreign operations approve only $69 million. The Senate meanwhile will vote on a foreign operations package that includes only $75 million for debt relief. These votes would leave the United States looking foolish at the next meeting of industrialised nations in July, where Washington could find scant support for its own initiatives. More important, countries that have sweated to meet all the criteria for debt relief are waiting. Congress should restore the administration's full request. If it does not, Mr. Clinton should veto the foreign operations bill.

The Guardian: Arms/UK: Britain exported 10 Hawk aircraft to Indonesia last year, the government confirmed yesterday. Its figures for the main weapons exports, including the heavily criticised sales to Indonesia, are contained in its annual return to the UN conventional arms register. The register also shows the extent to which Britain depends on the Gulf for weapons sales. Health: The World Health Organisation has produced a league table ranking the world's health services. Top of the list are France and Italy; 13 of the bottom 14 countries are HIPCs. Indonesia: Hundreds of militant Muslims fighting a holy war on the Indonesian spice islands killed more than 100 peopl in destroying a Christian village n Monday.

The Independent: Zimbabwe: As new reports of intimidation increased pressure on foreign observers to condemn the build-up to this weekend's Zimbabwean elections, the government decreed yesterday that fewer than a quarter of trained local monitors would have access to polling stations.

IHT: Haiti: Militant supporters of former president Jean-Bertrand Aristide paralysed Haiti's three biggest cities, blocking streets and setting a fire outside the US Embassy, in protests of delay over the results of June elections.

Tuesday 20^th June 2000

Reuters: Debt/developing countries: Leaders of developing nations at a G15 summit in Cairo yesterday blasted the West for shackling them with unjust trade terms and crushing debts, with Jamaica`s prime minister accusing the rich of consigning them to the 'graveyard of penury'. The G15 group of African, Asian and Latin American countries, whose ranks have swelled to 19 with the inclusion of Colombia and Iran, wants to raise its voice ahead of next month`s meeting of G8 industrialised nations. Pervical Patterson, the Jamaican prime minister, said “the industrialised north must not use globalisation to shirk its part in the war on poverty while developing nations ''buckle under the burden of external debt, perpetuated by those whose past transgressions, current intransigence and myopic vision will condemn us to the graveyard of penury''. Olusegun Obasanjo, the Nigerian president, also bemoaned the debt burden faced by the African continent. ''Debt is a millstone around Africa`s neck that needs to be removed.''

FT: Indonesia: Abdurrahman Wahid, Indonesian president has said that former president Suharto's family fortune of $25 billion is to be handed over to the state. He said that the Suharto familiy fortune would be surrendered after the attorney general's inquiry into graft charges against Mr Suharto was completed. Despite the statement from Mr Wahid, neither his advisers nor the ministry of finance expected such a large sum to be handed over. It is more than twice the government's annual budget. Thailand: Thailand, which formally graduated from a $17.2 billion IMF stabilisation programme yesterday, logged healthy first quarter economic growth of 5.2 per cent year on year. However, economists warned that the country needs to carry out significant corporate debt restructuring. Latin America: Latin American countries should rethink and strengthen social protection policies, the World Bank urged in a study published yesterday. Conventional unemployment insurance , self-insurance schemes and public works programmes are among the policies needed to address growing unease among Latin American countries about the social impact of liberal economic policies introduced from the mid-1980s, said the report. NGOs: Personal view from Michael Edwardes of the Ford Foundation, who argues that non-governmental organisations must implement reforms in order to bolster their legitimacy. He recognises that deeper debt relief and action on land mines, improvement of women's rights and action on the environment would not have happened without NGO ideas and pressure. Global finance: Six offshore financial centres have pledged to adopt international standards on transparency, co-operating on a global crackdown on tax evasion by the OECD. The six are Bermuda, the Cayman Islands, Cyprus, Malta, Mauritius and San Marino. Haiti: Jean-Bertrand Aristide, former president of Haiti, yesterday appeared set for another term as president of the Caribbean state, after claiming victory for his party despite incomplete results from last month's legislative elections. Trade: The World Trade Organisation (WTO), under fire from development groups who said it worked against the poor, yesterday issued a study arguing that trade liberalisation can help reduce poverty. The study, written by two academics from Britain and Israel, cited post-World War 2 experience in western Europe and the move to open trade between the US and Canada from the early 1960s as showing how opening of markets brought growth that raises living standards across all sections of society.

The Independent: Congo (Kinshasa): More than 400 civilians and 120 soldiers have been killed in clashes between Ugandan and Rwandan troops in the Congolese city of Kisangani this month, according to the International Committee of the Red Cross who visited the 45 hospitals in the city. Mexico: Mexico is preparing to reject the political party that has exerted an iron grip on the life of the country for as long as most people can remember. Polls consistently indicate that the seven-decade rule of the Partido Revolutionario Institutional (PRI) will be broken, an event as historically significant as the fall of the Berlin Wall, according to the main opposition candidate and presidential front-runner, Vicente Fox.

Monday 19^th June 2000

FT: Nigeria: FT leader advocates debt relief for Nigeria. The west has already waited too long to help Nigeria's democratically elected president, Olusegun Obasanjo. It must delay no longer. Hitherto Nigeria has been excluded from multilateral debt cancellation. With the previous regime in power, that was understandable; with the present one, it is unforgivable. How then should Nigeria be helped while preserving needed incentives for good performance? The answer is simple. The west should suspend virtually all official debt service, on a rolling basis, on condition that the country meets selected performance targets. Then, when a record has been built up, official debt should be drastically reduced. For the world's rich countries to persist in putting debt service ahead of the slim chances for stability in Nigeria is foolish and immoral. The west should start right now. Aid: FT leader urges OECD countries to agree the proposal to untie their aid to the 48 least developed countries. Rejection of the OECD agreement would send a damaging signal at a time when many poor countries are suspicious of further trade liberalisation. To run that risk in order to perpetuate a policy as indefensible as tied aid would not just be pusillanimous and hypocritical. It would be utterly irresponsible. World Trade: Director General of the World Trade Organisation argues in favour of free trade, saying that the WTO is a friend of the poor, and openness to trade alleviates poverty and helps developing countries catch up with rich ones. Philippines: International donors will today tell the Philippine government to step up its fight against corruption in the public and private sectors or face the prospect of further cuts in aid. Latin America: Latin America's economic recovery is picking up steam, according to forecasts by private sector economists, the Barcelona-based LatinFocus Consensus Forecast. But the pace of the revival from the sharp downturn in 1998 and 1999 is uneven, with prospects for Mexico, Brazil, and Chile improving and those for Argentina, Venezuela and Colombia deteriorating. Indonesia: Indonesia's military will keep operating many of its illegal businesses because the state budget is inadequate to fund a reform programme aimed at reducing the military's extensive influence. Tanzania: (Saturday's paper): The World Bank has approved a package which could involve nearly $1 billion of new loans to Tanzania over the next three years, despite the country's large stock of outstanding debt. Karen Joyner, policy officer at Christian Aid, criticises the move, saying it would undo the work of the Heavily Indebted Poor Countries (HIPC) debt relief initiative, which is

expected almost to halve the country's debt stock to $1.3 billion by the middle

of next year.

The Guardian: Haiti (Saturday's paper)/Jubilee 2000: Journalist Owen Boycott reports from the Haitian capital Port-au-Prince. Last week President Rene Preval signed a petition calling on international creditors to annul the country's swelling $1.2 billion debt. For a Caribbean nation whose independence was achieved through the only successful slave revolt in history the current campaign by the London-based organisation Jubilee 2000 to break the shackles of developing world indebtedness has a strong political resonance. Debt/G7: Charlotte Denny comments that the year since the G-8 summit in Cologne has been a year of broken promises. Of the $100 billion promised in Cologne, the only extra debt relief delivered has been $629 million for Uganda. Zimbabwe: A new opinion poll suggests that the opposition Movement for Democratic Change is poised to win 70 of the 120 contested parliamentary seats in the coming weekend's parliamentary election, raising the prospect of humiliation and defeat for President Mugabe's ruling Zanu-PF party. UK/developing countries: The Guardian gives its views on what the international agenda for a second term Labour government should be. The world's poor must be at the heart of the policy. Many of the world's poorest countries continue to be crippled by debt problems. Britain has led the way in tackling this question but we have to do more. In east Asia and Latin America debt owed to private creditors is destroying national development efforts. The government should work towards a new debt relief initiative, requiring private creditors to reduce demands where debt is undermining a country's basic services such as health and education. The article also calls for sweeping changes to IMF structural adjustment programmes: it is scandalous that IMF programmes consistently result in deep cuts in health, education and employment. Sierra Leone: Sierra Leone ahs asked the UN to set up an international tribunal to try the captured rebel leader, Foday Sankoh, for crimes against humanity. However, the plan faces uncertainty regarding the amnesty granted to the RUF leader last year. Haiti: Haiti's top election official has fled the country in fear for his life after being pressurised to release flawed election results, diplomatic sources said yesterday.

IHT: Ethiopia/Eritrea: Ethiopia and Eritrea have signed a preliminary cease-fire which includes plans for disengaging the two armies and devising a lasting solution.