Summit empowers developing world: Chinese media

CHINA: China’s media on Friday hailed the Group of 20 summit as a watershed event in Beijing’s push to secure the developing world a more powerful seat at the table of world economic policy.

“This is the first time that developed countries were not the sole guiding force. Emerging market countries got the chance to participate in a summit on formulating and revising global rules,” a Beijing Youth Daily commentary said. World leaders at the London summit pledged a raft of new money to battle the economic crisis, with China vowing an unprecedented contribution of 40 billion dollars to the International Monetary Fund. The meeting also signalled that developing countries would have more say in governing and guiding the world economy.

China went into the G20 summit calling for reform of a global financial system it views as dominated by developed Western countries, and its media celebrated what it saw as a turning of the tide.

“Even though developing countries have a long way to go in increasing their voice, (the summit) is a positive sign,” the Beijing News quoted economist Gao Haihong of the Chinese Academy of Social Sciences as saying. BEIJING, Friday, AFP