Saudi Arabia and India agree to study feasibility of establishing power grid    Saudi Awwal Bank records SR5.9 billion net profit after Zakat and Income Tax for YTD Q3    Economy minister emphasizes global partnerships to address pressing challenges Private investments in non-oil sector soar 70%    Saudi Arabia's GDP grows 2.8% in Q3, driven by non-oil sectors    PIF, HKMA sign MoU to establish $1 billion investment fund    Israeli soldiers forced Palestinian men to take off clothes as they evacuated war-torn Jabalya    North Korea fires suspected intercontinental missile    India celebrates Diwali, the festival of lights    'It was like a tsunami': Spaniards recount horror of deadly floods    Bahrain Crown Prince receives Saudi Interior Minister    In-person classes will remain suspended in Jeddah, Rabigh and Khulais schools on Thursday    HR Ministry takes penal action against 568 violators of Domestic Workers' Regulation    Derby Week makes its debut in the Roshn Saudi League    Al Nassr eliminated from King's Cup after a defeat to Al Taawoun    Teri Garr, Young Frankenstein and Tootsie star, dies at 79    Othman Al Omeir receives Legacy of Change Medal at the UK Parliament for advocacy in media    Neymar joins Saudi fashion trend, donning traditional attire at Al Hilal match    Indonesia Days event celebrates cultural diversity at Al Suwaidi Park    Saudi Football Federation reappoints Hervé Renard to lead national team    Tarzan star Ron Ely dies aged 86    India puts blockbuster Pakistani film on hold    The Vikings and the Islamic world    Filipino pilgrim's incredible evolution from an enemy of Islam to its staunch advocate    Muted Eid celebrations for millions of Nigerian Muslims    Exotic Taif Roses Simulation Performed at Taif Rose Festival    Asian shares mixed Tuesday    Weather Forecast for Tuesday    Saudi Tourism Authority Participates in Arabian Travel Market Exhibition in Dubai    Minister of Industry Announces 50 Investment Opportunities Worth over SAR 96 Billion in Machinery, Equipment Sector    HRH Crown Prince Offers Condolences to Crown Prince of Kuwait on Death of Sheikh Fawaz Salman Abdullah Al-Ali Al-Malek Al-Sabah    HRH Crown Prince Congratulates Santiago Peña on Winning Presidential Election in Paraguay    SDAIA Launches 1st Phase of 'Elevate Program' to Train 1,000 Women on Data, AI    41 Saudi Citizens and 171 Others from Brotherly and Friendly Countries Arrive in Saudi Arabia from Sudan    Saudi Arabia Hosts 1st Meeting of Arab Authorities Controlling Medicines    General Directorate of Narcotics Control Foils Attempt to Smuggle over 5 Million Amphetamine Pills    NAVI Javelins Crowned as Champions of Women's Counter-Strike: Global Offensive (CS:GO) Competitions    Saudi Karate Team Wins Four Medals in World Youth League Championship    Third Edition of FIFA Forward Program Kicks off in Riyadh    Evacuated from Sudan, 187 Nationals from Several Countries Arrive in Jeddah    SPA Documents Thajjud Prayer at Prophet's Mosque in Madinah    SFDA Recommends to Test Blood Sugar at Home Two or Three Hours after Meals    SFDA Offers Various Recommendations for Safe Food Frying    SFDA Provides Five Tips for Using Home Blood Pressure Monitor    SFDA: Instant Soup Contains Large Amounts of Salt    Mawani: New shipping service to connect Jubail Commercial Port to 11 global ports    Custodian of the Two Holy Mosques Delivers Speech to Pilgrims, Citizens, Residents and Muslims around the World    Sheikh Al-Issa in Arafah's Sermon: Allaah Blessed You by Making It Easy for You to Carry out This Obligation. Thus, Ensure Following the Guidance of Your Prophet    Custodian of the Two Holy Mosques addresses citizens and all Muslims on the occasion of the Holy month of Ramadan    







Thank you for reporting!
This image will be automatically disabled when it gets reported by several people.



Britain, Germany seek global finance summit
Published in The Saudi Gazette on 16 - 10 - 2008

Britain and Germany joined a French call on Wednesday for an international summit this year to overhaul of the world's financial order aimed at preventing a repeat of the worst credit crisis since the Great Depression.
European leaders meeting in Brussels feared that spill-over from the US subprime debacle could still plunge the global economy into recession, despite unprecedented rescues of banking giants this week that slowed a free-fall on world markets.
Concern about a deepening slowdown wiped away optimism earlier this week that the worst of the crisis might be over, with global stock prices falling sharply anew and investors scurrying into safe havens such as gold.
“We are not at the end of the crisis. We are still living in dangerous times,” Luxembourg Prime Minister Jean-Claude Juncker, chairman of 15 euro zone finance ministers said on arrival at an EU summit.
British Prime Minister Gordon Brown called for a rebuilding of the International Monetary Fund (IMF) as the keystone of global market regulation and said an early warning system was needed to detect potential future shocks to the global economy.
“I believe a forum to decide on big changes in the international economy can be held in the next few months,” he told a news conference just before the two-day summit began.
He said he expected the Group of Eight industrialized nations - the United States, Japan, Germany, France, Britain, Italy, Canada and Russia - plus key emerging nations such as China, India, Brazil and South Africa to hold a summit on financial reform in November or December.
Germany's Angela Merkel also firmly backed the idea, which French President Nicolas Sarkozy has pushed as the fastest way of revamping international financial structures set up over 60 years ago at the 1944 Bretton Woods conference.
“I explicitly support the idea that we should have a meeting this year, preferably in November, of the heads of state and government of the G8 countries and the emerging markets,” she told reporters on arrival.
Dutch Finance Minister Wouter Bos said a stronger role for the IMF was needed “in the absence of American leadership at the moment” and that the financial institution should help develop a structure of supervision for global markets.
Leaders of the euro zone agreed last Sunday on a concerted 2.2-trillion-euro ($3,023 billion) rescue of European banking giants hit by a credit crunch that began in the United States when house prices started to weaken.
Yet in the latest sign that global recession could follow hard on the heels of the credit crisis, new British figures showed unemployment shooting up to 5.7 percent at its fastest pace since a 1991 slump, with experts predicting worse to come.
“We are not out of the tunnel yet,” said Swedish Prime Minister Fredrik Reinfeldt, urging other EU members to back the measures taken by Britain and the 15 euro zone countries. “Then we have the tools to get out of the tunnel.”
The summit will give the executive European Commission a green light to come up with regulation of some areas of the financial sector. Commission President Jose Manuel Barroso called on Tuesday for a rethink of supervisory rules on markets, banks, hedge funds and private equity.
But a paper that Brown presented to summit leaders, seen by Reuters, omitted any mention of such European regulation, concentrating on a bigger oversight role for the IMF and the Financial Stability Forum, which have no powers of enforcement.
The Commission proposed on Wednesday higher minimum guarantees for bank deposits of 100,000 euros by 2009 and is due to produce guidelines on executive pay.
EU accounting regulators also voted to ease an accounting rule blamed by EU leaders for exacerbating the impact of the credit crunch on the continent's banks.
Critics blame the so-called fair value rule for forcing banks to take unnecessarily big writedowns after market prices on unpopular assets such as subprime securities fell.
In a separate gesture of support for one of the countries worst hit by the crisis, Belgium said its prime minister would visit Iceland on Friday to see how he could help its Kaupthing Bank, where thousands of Belgians fear for their savings.
Aside from the financial crisis, leaders will discuss issues normally weighty enough to dominate the meeting themselves. At stake is an EU goal of leading global efforts to tackle climate change by agreeing in December a plan to cut greenhouse gas emissions, save energy and boost renewable sources - but which industry and some governments fear could be too costly. The future of a stalled partnership pact with Russia, the bloc's main energy supplier, will come up after Moscow pulled its troops out of buffer zones around the rebel Georgian regions of South Ossetia and Abkhazia following August's conflict.
Irish Prime Minister Brian Cowen is also due to explain to fellow leaders why his country voted “No” to the Lisbon Treaty this year, throwing into doubt the future of institutional reforms which supporters argue the EU desperately needs


Clic here to read the story from its source.