The United States will support China for a modest increase in
its voting power at the International Monetary Fund (IMF), The
Washington Post reported on Thursday.
Timothy D. Adams, the Treasury Undersecretary for International
Affairs, was quoted as saying that the Bush administration will
support giving China and several other countries greater voting
power on the IMF board, reflecting these countries' growing clout
in the global economy.
The initiative is scheduled to come up before the IMF's
policy-making body at its annual meeting in Singapore on Sept.
18-19, according to the report.
The IMF must give greater representation to nations that
complain that their voting power lags behind their economic power,
said Adams, adding China's economy is twice the size of those of
Belgium and the Netherlands combined, but Belgium and the
Netherlands have 1.5 times as many votes.
Adams said that at the meetings in Singapore, "hopefully we'll
be able to bless" a deal that would give China, South Korea, Mexico
and Turkey "a down payment" in terms of their IMF power. He also
suggested that a more far-reaching reallocation of votes could come
later.
The Fund, traditionally dominated by the United States, European
countries and Japan, while discussing at a Wednesday meeting the
issue of a quota reallocation that included more countries, favored
the four countries cited by Adams, IMF spokesman David Hawley
said.
Speaking in Tokyo three weeks ago, the IMF Managing-Director
Rodrigo Rato said that the Singapore meeting should see immediate
changes to the voting powers of under-represented members.
"It's important, not so much to change the direction of the
institution but to give it stronger credibility, so that the most
dynamic economies get the representation their real economic weight
represents in the world," he said.
(Xinhua News Agency August 25, 2006)
