Kuwait for anti-poverty Asian fund

17 October 2012 03:21 am Views - 3522

Kuwait’s Emir Sheikh Sabah al-Ahmad al-Sabah yesterday proposed setting up a $2 billion fund to fight poverty in Asia and said the Gulf state will donate $300 million to its corpus. “In a bid to fight poverty and improve the standard of living ... I propose an initiative to set up a $2 billion programme,” Sheikh Sabah said as he opened the first Asia Cooperation Dialogue (ACD) summit. “In this context, I am pleased to announce that Kuwait will contribute $300 million to the fund.” Sheikh Sabah proposed that a pan-Asian development agency, like the Asian Development Bank, manage the programme that will finance development projects in the least developed Asian nations.

Several leaders including the rulers of Qatar, Bahrain and Bangladesh are attending the two-day summit along with representatives from other ACD countries.

Founded in Thailand in 2002, the ACD has 32 members including China, Japan, India and South Korea in addition to major oil producers in the Gulf, Iran and Russia.

The summit will discuss a variety of issues including energy supply, food security, financing of projects, IT and development of human resources among others.

It will also review the promotion of investments in Asian countries, especially by sovereign wealth funds.

Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, current chair of the NonAligned Movement, is expected to participate in the summit. (AFP)