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Leaders of poor nations arrive in Havana for major summit |
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April 12, 2000
HAVANA, APR 11 (AP) - Seeking a united voice in facing rich nations, dozens of leaders from the world's developing countries were gathering in Cuba to call for a greater share of the world's power and wealth. |
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It is the first time that the 133-nation "Group of 77," founded in 1964, is holding a summit at the level of heads of state. Until now, the organization has been a bloc within the United Nations. Working meetings of lower-level officials began Monday. Talks by heads of state were to take place Wednesday and Thursday.
HAVANA, APR 11 (UNB/AP) - Seeking a united voice in facing rich nations, dozens of leaders from the world's developing countries were gathering in Cuba to call for a greater share of the world's power and wealth.
It is the first time that the 133-nation "Group of 77," founded in 1964, is holding a summit at the level of heads of state. Until now, the organization has been a bloc within the United Nations. Working meetings of lower-level officials began Monday. Talks by heads of state were to take place Wednesday and Thursday.
The organization's chairman, Arthur Mbanefo of Nigeria, told a news conference Monday that it would look for ways to expand the benefits of globalization to poorer nations and to help them fit into the modern information-based society despite problems such as power and telephone shortfalls that make Internet connections difficult.
Mbafeno, his country's ambassador to the United Nations, also indicated the group may urge debt relief. "We would like to see a situation where some of this debt is canceled," he said, noting that some countries spend twice as much servicing their debts as they do on social services.
The summit is "unmistakable proof that our countries want our voice to be heard, that the interest of our countries, which are the majority, be taken into account," Cuban Foreign Minister Felipe Perez Roque told a news conference Monday.
Cuban and summit officials estimated that more than 60 heads of state or government would appear, along with scores of foreign ministers and other senior officials. By Monday, 122 member countries had sent delegations, as had 34 nonmember countries and 35 international organizations.
Already in Havana on Monday were Nigerian President Olusegun Obansanjo, Vietnamese President Tran Duc Luong, and U.N. Secretary-General Kofi Annan, who was formally greeted and escorted from the airport by Cuban leader Fidel Castro.
Also expected were leaders of Indonesia, South Africa, Cambodia, Venezuela, Pakistan and Palestine.
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