Dhaka for democratisation of int'l financial system

Bangladesh's permanent representative to the UN Dr Iftekhar Ahmed Chowdhury made the call at a meeting of the Economic (Second) Committee of the United Nations in New York on Monday, according to a message received here yesterday.

He raised the problems of the international financial system and foreign loans at the meeting.

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He welcomed the recent debt relief of few developing countries by the Rich and industrialised countries and at the same time called for the debt relief for all the developing countries without hindering the process with political considerations.

"Otherwise, the countries which maintained the rules and regulations, and did not default the repayment schedule will be penalised for their good achievement," he told the meeting.

The Bangladesh envoy strongly criticised the present system of keeping international reserves and said a huge amount of foreign currency either remain idle in the developing countries or invested at a very lower rate of interest.

He called for developing a system so that the developing countries could get interest-free loans against the international reserves.

On the impact of globalisation, Dr Iftekhar stressed the need for proper management of the strengths of globalisation for fair distribution of its benefits. "Otherwise", he warned, "the concept of globalisation would run the risk of being rejected by the developing countries."