Okay, when PMs and Presidents start hailing New World Orders, I get creepy crawlies
Brown hails `new world order’ in crisis fight
Friday, April 03, 2009
World leaders agreed a huge raft of spending yesterday to combat the economic crisis, pledging to lay out US$5 trillion (HK$39 trillion) by the end of 2010 as British Prime Minister Gordon Brown hailed a “new world order.”
The measures, agreed at a one-day summit in London, will see tax havens named and shamed, new rules on corporate pay, major reforms to the International Monetary Fund and World Bank, a new push to pass free trade rules and the sale of huge gold reserves to help poor countries. Brown said they were implementing the largest economic stimulus ever seen.
“A new world order is emerging, and with it we are entering into a new era of international cooperation,” Brown said after hosting a summit which brought together US President Barack Obama and leaders of the established and emerging powers from around the world.
Obama will be expected to make the biggest contribution to the initiative.
“The issues that people thought divided us did not divide us at all. There was substantial agreement to do whatever is necessary to return to growth,” Brown told a press conference, while warning there are “no quick fixes,” and the G20 would have to meet again this year.
European stock markets shot up in response to the accord, with London closing up 4.28 percent amid optimism following the summit and positive data from the United States.
Even French President Nicolas Sarkozy, who had threatened to walk out of the summit, said the results were “more than we
could have hoped for.” German Chancellor Angela Merkel said a “historic compromise” had been made. Before the summit, the United States and Britain had pushed for bigger stimulus spending while France and Germany had called for the focus to be put on greater regulation of the financial sector. But Brown trumpeted a deal he said benefited every country.
The G20 agreed to provide an extra US$1 trillion for the IMF and other global finance bodies, new rules on corporate bonuses to discourage bankers who take short term risks, and an extra US$250 billion to revive global trade.
They also ordered the IMF to sell some of its gold reserves to help the world’s poor countries, Brown said.
Brown said the IMF would undergo major reforms to reflect changes in the power structure of the world economy.
The IMF’s resources are to be tripled to about US$750 billion to help nations through the crisis. Brown, however, struck a note of caution: “Today’s decisions, of course, will not immediately solve the crisis. But we have begun the process by which it will be solved.”
Talks on the eve of the summit were clouded by protests which turned violent.
Small pockets of demonstrators built up around the summit and London’s main financial district, the day after thousands laid siege to the Bank of England and attacked a branch of Royal Bank of Scotland. One man died after collapsing during the protests. AGENCE FRANCE-PRESSE
