NZ aid groups welcome G8 poverty move

Aid organisations in New Zealand are welcoming an agreement by finance ministers from the world's richest countries to cancel the world's poorest countries' debts.

"Any move to address the crippling burden of debt on the world's poorest countries has to be welcomed," said Peter Zwart, programmes manager for Caritas Aotearoa New Zealand -- the Catholic agency for justice peace and development.

Barry Coates, the executive director of Oxfam New Zealand, welcomed the move as a "great step forward", yet warned against the rich using it as an opportunity to impose "unfair and inappropriate conditions, such as privatisation and liberalisation".

The Group of Eight (G8) -- Britain, Japan, Canada, the United States, France, Italy, Germany and Russia -- announced a deal on Saturday to write off all the multilateral debts of some of the world's poorest countries.

The 18 countries are: Benin, Bolivia, Burkina Faso, Ethiopia, Ghana, Guyana, Honduras, Madagascar, Mali, Mauritania, Mozambique, Nicaragua, Niger, Rwanda, Senegal, Tanzania, Uganda and Zambia.

With three weeks to go to the G8 summit in Gleneagles, Scotland, Mr Coates said the pressure is now on for world leaders to tackle other challenges -- "to announce a doubling of aid by 2015 and to commit themselves to making serious progress on reforming unfair trade rules".

- NZPA