Big emerging economies such as China, India and Saudi Arabia will not aid the West in its financial crisis unless they are given more influence in running the global economy, Prince Turki Al-Faisal, former intelligence chief, said Monday. “The financial crisis and great recession were born in the West, developed in the West yet hit hard throughout the world,” Prince Turki said in a speech at the sixth Global Competitiveness Forum here. He said this showed the need to give emerging economies more representation and more authority in global bodies such as the Group of 20 nations, a forum of the world's major industrialized countries, and the Financial Stability Board (FSB), which discusses regulation of banks and financial markets. So far, however, organizations such as the FSB “have yet to take these new realities into consideration”, while the G20 is making little headway in coordinating economic policymaking around the world, he said. The lack of influence of big emerging economies in international bodies reduces their willingness to contribute money to fight the global crisis, he warned. The International Monetary Fund is seeking to more than double its war chest by raising $600 billion in new resources to help countries deal with the fallout of the euro zone's sovereign debt crisis. “What we can be certain of is that large developing nations will not agree to provide additional funds without a greater say in the IMF, and this applies to all global economic governance organizations,” Prince Turki said. His speech criticized Western governments for “leveraging up” their economies over the past six decades and letting their financial sectors spiral out of control, saying the United States and the European Union would continue to struggle with debt problems for five or 10 years. Much of his criticism echoed comments by officials in China, another emerging economy that is being asked to help fight the global financial crisis. Saudi Arabia, he said, would continue to play a stabilizing role but added that because it faced its own challenges, including the need to create jobs for a young population, it would need in the future to focus more of its resources domestically and within the Middle East. “We will continue to support our neighbors where we are able, including financially, but now we also face new exigencies of our own,” he said.
