Leaders of the world's poorest countries met Friday to wrap up a summit focused on how to stop escalating food and fuel prices amid financial market turbulence in developed nations. The 79 members of the African, Caribbean and Pacific (ACP) rim of nations were expected to adopt a declaration calling on the international community to agree on a strategy to stabilise oil prices at affordable levels.
They were also due to adopt at the closing ceremony a text asking donor countries to help develop alternative, more sustainable sources of energy. ACP nations were to reaffirm their commitment to alleviating the food price crisis by developing ways of processing agricultural produce, according to the draft resolutions to be adopted.
With a combined population of around 700 million people, the ACP rim groups the poorest nations on Earth and the Accra talks came amid the financial crisis in developed countries, on which the poor nations depend for aid.
"It is a great concern ... that the ongoing food and fuel prices crisis and the global financial crisis that is currently shaking the world would definitely erode the progress that many developing countries have made towards achievement of the MDGs," Tanzanian Prime Minister Mizengo Peter Pinda said.
He was referring to the UN Millennium Development Goals that were launched in 2000 with the aim of halving poverty in the world by 2015 from 1990 levels. He said ACP member states "should with one voice remind the leaders of the G8 that a promise made is a debt in itself," referring to its pledge to double aid by 2010.
Another controversial issue under the spotlight at the summit are the new Economic Partnership Agreements (EPAs), which ACP countries are due to sign with the EU. These pacts would require ACP nations to gradually open their markets to European goods in exchange for open access to European markets.
The pacts proposed by the EU are meant to replace existing trade deals giving European countries preferential market access to former colonies, but have been ruled illegal by the World Trade Organisation. In a sign of looming splits, a number of ACP nations have initialled interim deals, some of which are due for conclusion within weeks, despite strong reservations from critics on the long term impact on the poorer nations' economies.
Pinda criticised the "inflexibility of the European Commission in resolving contentious issues which are fundamental to the development aspirations of the ACP." Attendance by the heads of states has been low-key with Sudanese President Omar al-Bashir seemingly the only heavyweight in town, but he reportedly left Thursday after he delivered his speech as the outgoing chairman of ACP.
Technically Bashir ran the risk of arrest in Accra had the International Criminal Court (ICC), which is trying to indict him on charges of war crimes in Darfur, issued an arrest warrant while he was here.
On Thursday the Sudanese leader said that any attempt to arrest him would have "a catastrophic effect on the whole region." Apart from the host President John Kufour, other leaders participating are the prime minister of Niue Island, Toke Talagi Tufukuyu, the vice president of Burundi, Yves Sahingunvu, and deputy prime minister of Kenya, Uhuru Kenyata. Mauritanian Prime Minister Moulaye Ould Mohamed, Tanzania's Pinda and Papua New Guinea's Michael Somare also attended the summit.
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