The Antichrist HAS a plan Mr. Clinton. When will he appear to let us know what it is?
South China Morning Post - Hong Kong - 10/07/98
DUNCAN HUGHES in Washington
Bill Clinton said yesterday the worst economic crisis in 50 years could be contained by global action, but warned it might still
spread.
The US President, speaking at the International Monetary Fund/World Bank meeting, said: ''We must take steps to help those who
have been hurt by it, limit the reach of it and restore confidence in the global economy.''
World Bank governors, finance leaders, bankers and agencies representing 182 countries were represented at the meeting.
Mr Clinton warned against ''false cures'', such as controls on capital flows and trade protectionism, and urged continuing
liberalisation and reform.
He signalled next month's Asia-Pacific Economic Co-operation forum meeting in Malaysia as an opportunity to ''tear down the
barriers'' obstructing free trade.
The President also called for reforms that would ''tame the pattern of boom and bust on an international scale'' while maintaining
economic growth in the United States and Europe.
Millions of victims of the economic slump in Asia, Russia and Latin America should be given aid to help rebuild their lives and boost
support for the reform measures, he said.
IMF managing director Michel Camdessus told the meeting a global recession could be avoided.
Mr Camdessus said: ''If we keep a steady nerve, if all countries pursue stability, structural adjustment and orderly liberalisation of
their economies, this crisis can be overcome.'' He defended the fund's controversial programmes in Asia and said longer-term
stability would result from repairing shortcomings in the global economy.
World Bank president James Wolfensohn said an estimated 20 million people fell back into poverty in East Asia during the past 12
months because of the regional crisis.
He said the bank's role needed to move beyond projects and crisis firefighting to sustainable development.
He said: ''In the wake of crisis, we need a second framework, one that deals with the projects in structural reforms necessary for
long-term growth, one that includes the human and social accounting ...
''At the bank, we have developed and are experimenting with a new approach one that is not imposed by us on our clients but
developed by them with our help.''
Earlier, Financial Secretary Donald Tsang Yam-kuen proposed a new approach for regulating international capital flows to reduce
the risk of economic crises.
He called on industrialised nations to address immediately the ''crisis of confidence'' eroding the global financial system.
And Mr Tsang urged that the rules of global capital flows to increase regulation and supervision of banks, hedge funds and other
international investors be rewritten. ''There will be angry markets awaiting us if nothing substantive emerges by the time we leave
Washington,'' he said. |
