Caribbean summit in Cuba calls for UN to play financial role

By JERUSALEM POST STAFF
The Caribbean Community trade bloc said Monday that the United Nations should help reform world financial systems, providing more regulation to prevent crises that hit small countries hardest. Wrapping up a one-day summit, Cuba and the group's 14 mostly island member nations decreed "the need for fundamental reform of the international financial architecture" under UN auspices. Members called for stronger international supervision of financial markets to prevent the kind of banking meltdown that has shaken the world. Antigua Prime Minister Baldwin Spencer, whose country holds the organization's rotating presidency, said that rich countries still depend on developing countries for trade. "It is important that there is some degree of recognition and understanding that if developing countries are marginalized and they are unable to meet basic needs of their populations, then the economies of the developed countries could also be impacted," he said in an interview following closed-door meetings in the eastern city of Santiago. The leaders also pledged to pool their countries' resources to promote renewable energy sources, though there was no agreement on of how much money they would collectively pledge for such an initiative.