Officials gather for economic discussions
Officials gather for economic discussions
KUALA LUMPUR (AFP): Asia-Pacific finance officials will meet here over the weekend to discuss a regional surveillance mechanism aimed at warding off potential future crises, and the burning issue of capital controls.
The meeting of the so-called Manila Framework -- a regional surveillance group formed in the Philippine capital in November 1997 following the East Asian financial crisis -- will ponder over reforms for the global monetary system, the Malaysian finance ministry said.
"This third meeting in Malaysia will focus on regional surveillance issues and developments in financial markets especially with respect to restoring private capital flows, as well as issues related to the reform of the architecture of the international financial system," it said.
Sources told AFP that Malaysia's central Bank Negara was expected to brief delegates on the country's controversial foreign exchange controls imposed in September to insulate it from foreign pressure.
Under the controls aimed at hauling the economy from its first recession in 13 years, the ringgit was fixed at 3.80 to the dollar and made virtually non-convertible abroad.
The Kuala Lumpur talks will be attended by senior finance officers and deputy central bankers from Australia, Brunei, Canada, China, Hong Kong, Indonesia, Japan, Korea, New Zealand, the Philippines, Singapore, Thailand and the United States.
The U.S. delegation will be led by Timothy Geithner, who is senior deputy assistant secretary for international affairs in the US treasury, diplomats said.
Officials from the Asian Development Bank, the World Bank and the International Monetary Fund (IMF) will also attend the two- day talks.
The World Bank would be led by its senior vice-president Joseph Stiglitz and vice-president for East Asia and the Pacific Jean-Michel Severino while the IMF is represented by deputy managing director Stanley Fischer.
After the grouping's formation in Manila, officials met for a second time in Tokyo in March followed by an ad-hoc meeting in June centered around Japan's crisis and the plunging yen.
The Manila framework is aimed at putting in place a regional monitoring mechanism to complement IMF's global supervision, with a cooperative financing arrangement with the Washington-based Fund.
It is also designed to enhance regional economic and technical cooperation, and supporting a stronger IMF to respond to future financial crises.
The weekend meeting in Kuala Lumpur comes ahead of the Asia Pacific Economic Cooperation (APEC) leaders' summit on 17-18 November.