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Gordon Brown, Britain's chancellor of the exchequer , is pleased that
the deal he sponsored and worked on for many years is now becoming a
reality.
"Agreement is now reached on all the elements.
The managing director has informed the committee that he will now call the
executive board together to complete its approval of the arrangements to
deliver debt relief by the end of 2005."
Trevor Manuel, South Africa's finance minister, Sunday announced that
the World Bank had joined the International Monetary Fund in endorsing the
debt reduction agreement.
"I think we can all say thank you
very much to the World Bank and the IMF. The development
committee is satisfied as is reflected in the communiqué that
those agreements are met."
New World Bank president Paul Wolfowitz, agreed that the debt reduction
accord is a significant achievement.
"The high
point of the meetings is the historic endorsement provided by both
the development committee and the IMFC of the G8 proposals to cancel 100
percent of the debts of some of the world's poorest countries," he says.
For the first time, official debts to the IMF and
the World Bank are being canceled with the financial shortfall
being made up by fresh
contributions from rich countries. The debt deal was initialed last July
at Gleneagles, Scotland at the summit of the leaders of the Group of Eight
industrialized countries.
The G8 includes the United States, Japan, Canada, Britain, France,
Germany, Italy and Russia. | 
