Prince Abdul Aziz Bin Abdullah, Deputy Minister of Foreign Affairs, attends the Asia Cooperation Dialogue (ACD) summit in Kuwait City, Tuesday. — SPA KUWAIT CITY – Kuwait's Emir Sheikh Sabah Al-Ahmad Al-Sabah Tuesday proposed setting up a $2 billion fund to fight poverty in Asia and said the Gulf state will donate $300 million to its corpus. “In a bid to fight poverty and improve the standard of living ... I propose an initiative to set up a $2 billion program,” Sheikh Sabah said as he opened the first Asia Cooperation Dialogue (ACD) summit. “In this context, I am pleased to announce that Kuwait will contribute $300 million to the fund.” Sheikh Sabah proposed that a pan-Asian development agency, like the Asian Development Bank, manage the program that will finance development projects in the least developed Asian nations. Several leaders including the leaders of Qatar, Bahrain and Bangladesh are attending the two-day summit along with representatives from other ACD countries. Founded in Thailand in 2002, the ACD has 32 members including China, Japan, India and South Korea in addition to major oil producers in the Gulf, Iran and Russia. The summit will discuss a variety of issues including energy supply, food security, financing of projects, IT and development of human resources among others. It will also review the promotion of investments in Asian countries, especially by sovereign wealth funds. “Our Asian continent is the largest and most populated… enjoying a rich history and cultural diversity that contributed in advancing science and human knowledge throughout time. This requires us to reinvigorate joint efforts toward more coordination and consultation,” said Kuwait's Deputy Prime Minister Sheikh Sabah Al-Khaled Al-Sabah before a preparatory meeting of ACD foreign ministers Monday. Sheikh Sabah, also foreign minister, said that Kuwait has realized the importance of its Asian outreach, as it started to expand its diplomatic representation in the continent with missions in Asian countries nearing 40 percent of the total diplomatic representation of Kuwait overseas. He said that Kuwait is eager to support development efforts in Asia by financing different projects through the Kuwait Fund for Arab Economic Development and in cooperation with the governments concerned, adding that the estimated volume of grants and developmental assistance to beneficiary countries amounts to $5.5 billion. – Agencies
