G-8 DEVELOPED COUNTRIES URGED TO INVEST IN GLOBAL PEACE

Jakarta, June 18 (ANTARA) - The chairman of Indonesia's second largest Muslim organization Muhammadiyah, Din Syamsuddin, has called on the Group of Eight (G-8) developed countries to invest in the preservation of global peace.

He made the call at a meeting of 200 world religious figures in Rome held to formulate inputs for G-8 leaders who will convene in July, Muhammadiyah said in a press statement on Wednesday.

Speaking on behalf of Muslim countries, Syamsuddin said the global disorder marked by global food, energy, environmental and financial crises was the result of developed countries' greed and egoism.

The developed countries' behavior had led to global injustice, widespread poverty, unempolyment, backwardness, environmental destruction, pendemics, wars and various forms of violence, he said.

On the other hand, the big powers had spent huge funds on military hardware and wars, he said.

For his part, Syamuddin said, he was proposing to change the world's development paradigm from "merely sustainable development" to "meaningful sustainable development".

In economic terms, the new development paradigm should not only pursue growth at the expense of social justice and even distribution but also reject natural resource exploitation without environmental conservation efforts, he said.

He said developed countries must invest in creating global peace by, among other things, taking concrete steps to achieve the Millennium Development Goals (MDGs) they had agreed on since 2000, he said.

Developed nations should prioritize "soft power or love power" rather than "hard power" in dealing with problems facing the rest of the world, he said.