Indian PM asks NAM to make efforts to dismantle terror infrastructure

V Mohan Narayan
Sharm el-Sheikh (Egypt), Jul 15 (PTI) The two-day NAM
summit opened Wednesday with a call from Indian Prime Minister
Manmohan Singh to the grouping to deny terrorists safe havens,
make vigorous efforts to dismantle terror infrastructure and
bring to justice terrorists and those who aid and abet them.

Addressing the plenary session, Singh also warned that
there could be a period of prolonged stagflation if the
aftermath of the global financial crisis was not carefully
managed.

Singh, who will meet his Pakistani counterpart Yousuf
Raza Gilani Thursday, told the 118-member Non-Aligned Movement
(NAM) that in recent years terrorist groups have become more
organised and more daring.

"Terrorists and those who aid and abet them must be
brought to justice," Singh said without naming any country.
The Prime Minister will be meeting Gilani Thursday to

seek a categorical commitment from him that Pakistani soil
will not be used for terror attacks directed against India.

In his address, Singh said the infrastructure of
terrorism must be dismantled and there should be no safe
havens for terrorists because they do not represent any cause,
group or religion.

The Prime Minister made a strong pitch for the
comprehensive Convention on International Terrorism mooted by
India in the United Nations. "It is time that we agree" on
such a convention, he said.

Singh noted that extremism, intolerance and terrorism
"are our antitheses" since they "seek to destroy us and our
Movement."

The Prime Minister noted that no non-aligned summit
has ever been held in an economic and financial crisis of the
magnitude that now gripped the world.

The global recession has strengthened protectionism in
developed countries' markets, drastically reduced developing
nations' exports and choked credit and capital flow to the
Third World.

Singh told the Summit under the new chairmanship of
Egypt that with the benefits and burdens of globalisation so
unfairly distributed, it would be even harder for developing
economies to cope with the crisis.

"If the aftermath of the crisis is not carefully
managed, and if the abundance of liquidity leads to a revival
of speculative acitivites, we may well see a period of
prolonged stagflation," he said.

Crucially, for the developing world, a continuing
slowdown will force more and more people from these countries
back into poverty, bringing down levels of nutrition, health
and education, he said.

The Prime Minister emphasised that the Non-Aligned
Movement has a great stake in ensuring that steps planned to
revive the global economy take into account the concerns of
the developing countries.

These include the challenges of food security, energy
security, enviormemnt and reforms of institutions of global
governance, he said.

"They are embedded in the economic crisis and must be
dealt with comprehensively and with a sense of urgency. We
have a crucial stake in a rule-based multilateral trading
system and in an early conclusion of a balanced and fair
agreement in the Doha Round," Singh said.

Singh said the relevance of NAM has never been greater
than today and felt cooperation, trade and investment among
these countries could contribute significantly to reviving the
world economy.

He regretted that decision-making processes, whether
in the UN or the international financial institutions,
continued to be based on charters written more than 60 years
ago though the world has changed greatly since then.

The Prime Minister made a strong demand for the voice
of emerging economies to be heard in world bodies. "Developing
countries must be fully represented in the decision-making
levels of international institutions if they are to remain
effective and have the legitimacy they need to play their
roles in an increasingly integrated world."

Voicing concern over the accumulation of greenhouse
gases resulting from over two centuries of industrial activity
and unsustainable lifestyles in the developed world, Singh
asserted that any equitable solution to the problem of climate
change should acknowledge this "historical responsibility."

Developing countries, including India, insist that the
climate change taking place today is because of accumulated
emissions ever since the industrial revolution and developed
countries should take greater responsibility in tackling it.

They feel that emission control standards could not be
applied equally on them.

Developing countries, Singh said, were the
worst-affected by climate change. They had the biggest stake
in ensuring the success of global efforts to tackle climate
change.

"We recognise more than anyone else our obligation to
preserve and protect the environment. We are already making
our significant contribution in this regard, but climate
change action must not perpetuate the poverty of the
developing countries," Singh said.

He stressed that the weight of NAM should be used to
achieve a comprehensive, balanced and equitable outcome in the
ongoing multilateral negotiations leading up to the Copenhagen
conference in December this year. PTI