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R Jagannathan
DURBAN, Sept 3: Prime Minister Atal Behari Vajpayee on Thursday asserted the importance of economic sovereignty of countries to protect themselves against the excesses of marketplace anarchy.
Delivering his address to the 12th NAM summit here on Thursday, Vajpayee said: "We have heard ad nauseam that we should trust the magic of the marketplace. We have discovered the hard way that the magic wears off fast. And in each country the marketplace has to be run according to rules which that country must determine as the only guardian of the well-being of its people."
Taking a line similar to prime minister M Mahathir of Malaysia, Vajpayee also pointed out that while countries were being asked to learn from the Southeast Asian crisis and exercise firmer controls on domestic financial institutions, no agenda has been set for bringing "international controls or accountability to the international marketplace, or to examine the systemic flaws in the architecture of the international financial and monetary systemor the havoc it plays...".
The prime minister said that the Asian crisis would not end there. "All of us will be touched by it." In this context, he said NAM must therefore take decisions to set up a system through which the movement can work continuously on the critical economic issues of the day. "If the non-aligned movement does not shape the future of the international economy through continuous attention, it is we who will suffer most from the consequences of this neglect," he added.
Vajpayee also expressed concern over declining official development assistance and said "ways must be devised to make decision-making in international financial and trade institutions equitable and more responsive to our requirements." He said the development focus of their activities needs to be restored."
The prime minister's speech also dealt with India's strong efforts in the past to promote nuclear disarmament in a non-discriminatory way. He criticised the double-standards of the nuclear haves and said the Nuclearnon-Proliferation Treaty "cannot provide a lasting and genuine solution to the problem of proliferation." In this connection, he called on NAM to renew its commitment to the goal of a nuclear weapons-free world.
Copyright © 1998 Indian Express Newspapers (Bombay) Ltd.
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