France and South Africa will jointly push for a range of solutions to fund development and climate-change initiatives within the Group of 20 industrialized and emerging nations, French President Nicolas Sarkozy said Wednesday.
Speaking at a joint press conference with South African President Jacob Zuma, who is on his first state visit to France since his election, Sarkozy said the two countries' finance ministers were tasked to "work on a range of innovative financing solutions" to be presented to their G-20 peers in order to fund development needs and climate-change initiatives.
As the current head of the G-20, France has repeatedly said it will try to convince its partners of the need to create a tax on financial transactions to address these issues in the face of rising budget deficits in developed countries. France favors a tax on currency transactions but there are other ideas on the table, such as a tax on shipping containers.
The idea of a financial-transactions tax has proved unpopular with most G-20 members, while Germany has said it wants euro-zone countries to look into the possibility of imposing the tax within the bloc.
South Africa has only shown limited support for a financial-transactions tax, fearing it could hurt its growing financial sector.
Commenting on the situation in Libya, Sarkozy said a military intervention "isn't an appropriate decision" at this stage, but he added that France is closely monitoring the decisions of the United Nations' Security Council on the matter.
"We can't turn our backs on the victims of Gadhafi's murderous madness," he said. Sarkozy said France has sent its second-largest warship, the helicopter carrier Mistral, to waters off Libya for humanitarian purposes as foreigners are evacuated from the area.
Source: http://www.automatedtrader.net
Speaking at a joint press conference with South African President Jacob Zuma, who is on his first state visit to France since his election, Sarkozy said the two countries' finance ministers were tasked to "work on a range of innovative financing solutions" to be presented to their G-20 peers in order to fund development needs and climate-change initiatives.
As the current head of the G-20, France has repeatedly said it will try to convince its partners of the need to create a tax on financial transactions to address these issues in the face of rising budget deficits in developed countries. France favors a tax on currency transactions but there are other ideas on the table, such as a tax on shipping containers.
The idea of a financial-transactions tax has proved unpopular with most G-20 members, while Germany has said it wants euro-zone countries to look into the possibility of imposing the tax within the bloc.
South Africa has only shown limited support for a financial-transactions tax, fearing it could hurt its growing financial sector.
Commenting on the situation in Libya, Sarkozy said a military intervention "isn't an appropriate decision" at this stage, but he added that France is closely monitoring the decisions of the United Nations' Security Council on the matter.
"We can't turn our backs on the victims of Gadhafi's murderous madness," he said. Sarkozy said France has sent its second-largest warship, the helicopter carrier Mistral, to waters off Libya for humanitarian purposes as foreigners are evacuated from the area.
Source: http://www.automatedtrader.net
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