India for more trade among NAM members for economic revival

V Mohan Narayan

Sharm El-Sheikh (Egypt), July 15 (PTI) India Wednesday
said the global recession had strengthened protectionist
measures in developed countries and the Non-Aligned nations
should engage in greater trade and investment for their
economic revival.

"The crisis, the worst in living memory, emanated from
the advanced industrial economies, but the developing
economies, the members of our Movement, have been the hardest
hit.

"The global recession has strengthened
protectionism... drastically reduced developing country
exports and choked credit and capital flows to the third
world," Indian Prime Minister Manmohan Singh said at the 15th
summit of NAM in this Egyptian Red Sea resort town.

Last week, a grouping of five developing countries had
asked the world's eight most rich nations to shed export
subsidies to clinch a global trade deal. The world leaders
then pledged to seek a balanced conclusion to the Doha
Development Round in 2010.

Singh told the 118-nation NAM summit: "Cooperation,
trade and investment among our countries can contribute
significantly to reviving the world economy".

The NAM was conceived by India's first Prime Minister
Jawaharlal Nehru, former Egyptian President Gamal Abdul Nasser
and former Yugoslav president Josip Broz Tito in 1955.

"With the benefits and burdens of globalisation so
unfairly distributed, it will be even harder for our economies
to cope with the crisis," Singh said and called for careful
management in the aftermath of the crisis to prevent revival
of speculative activities that in the first place led to the
downturn.

He warned that a continuing slowdown will force more
people in the developing countries back into poverty.

He also said: "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." PTI