Posted on 03/22/2002 5:51:15 PM PST by ATOMIC_PUNK
MONTERREY, Mexico (Reuters) - President Bush pledged more cash on Friday to poor nations that root out corruption and world leaders said his announcement helped breathe new life into a long-stalled global war on want.
The U.S. president laid down tough terms for developing countries that want fresh handouts, saying they need to stamp out graft and inefficiency to reap the benefits of a new global willingness to give more aid.
In a speech on the closing day of a five-day U.N. conference on development financing, Bush led calls from the world's rich countries that developing nations can expect more aid if they pursue sound policies and open their markets.
"We must tie greater aid to political and legal and economic reforms," Bush told more than 50 world leaders who have been forging a strategy to help haul the impoverished out of misery at a time when the war on need must vie for attention with a worldwide offensive against terrorism.
Mexico's President Vicente Fox, who hosted the meeting in the northern industrial city of Monterrey, said rich countries and poor had struck a new bargain to fight poverty.
"We can speak of a new commitment between countries in the vanguard and countries bringing up the rear," Fox told a news conference at the end of the summit.
"Financing for development had not come under such close scrutiny for a long time, for decades," he said.
Recent promises from Washington and the European Union of more help for the world's needy after years of decline in the flow of development funds have stirred a new mood of hope and saved the Monterrey summit from embarrassing failure.
SUMMIT HAD SEEMED DOOMED TO FAILURE
"Only a few weeks ago this summit was heading for failure," Spain's Prime Minister Jose Maria Aznar said. "We therefore have reasons to be satisfied."
Bush said rewards for poor nations who put their economic houses in order would be great but those who dragged their feet on stamping out corruption and running their governments cleanly would be left behind, Bush said.
Bush came to Monterrey to thank key allies in the war on terrorism and promote his three-year, $10 billion promise to boost aid to poor countries in the face of criticism that Washington's foreign aid spending was too tight-fisted.
Haitian President Jean Bertrand Aristide gave leaders a sharp reminder of the widening gulf between the elite club of rich nations and their globe-trotting business tycoons and struggling nations stuck in grinding poverty.
The United Nations' 189 members adopted a global plan on Friday to line up financial resources required to battle AIDS, provide universal primary school education and halve by 2015 the number of people living on less than a dollar a day.
The goals were set at the 2000 U.N. millennium summit in New York. Some 1.2 billion people now live in extreme poverty.
The Monterrey plan, drafted in advance and adopted by acclamation, envisions freer trade, more foreign investment, debt relief and efficient government as well as extra aid.
"Our economic statistics place us among the 48 countries whose total gross national product is equivalent to the holdings of the world's three richest people," said Aristide.
Bush later denied suggestions he had forced Cuban President Fidel Castro's abrupt departure on Thursday, when the communist leader stomped out of the conference after a short speech.
"I know of no pressure placed on anybody. Fidel Castro can do what he wants to do," said Bush at a news conference when asked whether he had insisted that his Mexican hosts make sure he did not have to cross paths with Castro.
"What I'm uncomfortable about is the way he treats his people," added Bush, when asked if meeting Castro would have bothered him.
U.S. LAGS EUROPE, JAPAN IN DONOR STAKES
The European Union has gone further than the United States in unveiling more cash for the world's needy, promising last week to raise $7 billion a year more from 2006. The EU has promised to peg its aid to 0.39 percent of its gross domestic product, up from 0.33 percent at present.
Bush acknowledged appeals from developing nations for rich countries to pull down trade barriers that the world's poor say throttle their hopes of climbing up the ladder of prosperity.
"To be serious about fighting poverty, we want to be serious about expanding trade," said Bush, adding "trade brings expectations of freedom."
The European Union has been singled out by poor nations as a major culprit in shutting out cheap food imports from the developing world by supporting its own farmers with billions of dollars in export subsidies.
EU Commission President Romano Prodi acknowledged the subsidies had to be cut back. "We are working to have in the future a new agricultural policy more in the interest of the less-developed countries. We are decreasing the farm subsidies," Prodi told Reuters in an interview.
French President Jacques Chirac added his voice to appeals for more help to extricate poor nations from their desperate plight, condemning economic misery as "morally unacceptable, politically dangerous and economically absurd."
World leaders said the conference marked a sea change in attitudes toward foreign aid. There was now a consensus that more money was needed after years of declining aid levels, but on condition that safeguards were in place to assure the extra cash produced measurable results, they said.
U.N. Secretary-General Kofi Annan acknowledged some donor nations hesitated to pledge more money "because they are not convinced that aid works."
"To them I say, 'Look at the record.' There is abundant evidence that aid does work," the U.N. leader said.
YEA AMERICAN MONEY AND FOOD TO COUNTRY'S RICH ENOUGH TO FEED THEIR OWN F THE UNITED NATIONS
FOLLOW THE MONEY
DISTRIBUTE THE WEALTH
"We must build the institutions of freedom, not subsidize the failures of the past."
They just couldn't bring themselves to repeat the clearest message of the day
Mr. Aristide, your nation is Haiti. Haiti is among the most hopeless and helpless nations in the world. They have tried monarchy, dictatorship, communism, theocracy, capitalism and democracy (of a sort) since their "independance". No system they have ever adopted has worked. Everyone who has tried to run that country has ended up either exiled or dead or both.
You see, Mr. Aristide, wealth is an end product, created by societies that can comprehend, agree to and abide by the principles of wealth creation, these principles being belief in the right to private property, the willingness to sacrifice now for future gain, the willingness to accept the restrictions of living under the rule of law. Little things like that. Little things that Haitians have proven themselves incapable of accomplishing for themselves.
The good news, Mr. Aristide, is that the rest of the world has figured this out, and is no longer willing to extend aid to hopeless basket cases like Haiti. If you really want to help your people I suggest you read "The Wealth of Nations" by Adam Smith. Not that there is any hope of improving Haiti, but at least you'll understand why there is no hope.
Can I use that argument with the IRS and pay no taxes this year?
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