----- Original Message ----- 
From: Clement Okurut 
To: [log in to unmask] 
Sent: Tuesday, November 11, 2003 11:07 PM
Subject: Third World Loses $200bn Through Capital Flight - UN Secretary General Kofi Anna


Third World Loses $200bn Through Capital Flight - UN Secretary General Kofi Annan

Daily Trust (Abuja)

November 5, 2003 
Posted to the web November 5, 2003 

Emmanuel Yashim, With Agency Report


In 2002, for the sixth consecutive year, developing countries made a net transfer of financial resources of almost 200 billion dollars to other countries, the United Nations Secretary-General, Mr Kofi Annan has said.

Annan who spoke at the high-level dialogue of the general Assembly on financing for development, said such a situation lacked common sense.

Funds should be moving from developed countries to developing countries, but these numbers tell us the opposite is happening," he said.

"Funds that could be promoting investment and growth in developing countries, or building schools and hospitals, are instead being transferred abroad."

He argued that in spite of promising investment opportunities in the developing world, including improved economic policies, fear and uncertainty were keeping the resources from being deployed where they were needed most.

"If what we say about financing for development is not to ring hollow, if financing for development means anything, we must reverse this negative balance sheet, and fix the system so that all countries, and all people, especially the poorest can benefit," he said.

The UN scribe, however, said that the Monterrey forum on the third world succeeded in breaking new grounds by attracting all the relevant stakeholders under an umbrella to improve policy coherence.

"Perhaps most important of all, was the way both the developed and developing countries

acknowledged their mutual responsibilities and mutual accountability, a welcome departure from the polarising practice of pointing at what others were not doing," Annan posted.

Calling for increased Official Development Aid (ODA) to assist developing countries meet the standards set in the Millennium Development Goals, he said trade was an important segment of development.

"We have all seen what trade can do to create jobs and wealth, but we also know how subsidies and tariffs are stifling the ability of poor countries to compete fairly in the international trading system and trade their way out of poverty," he added.






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