27.02.2012, Jeddah, KSA – At a consultative meeting held at IDB headquarters with United Nations Conference on Trade and Development (UNCTAD), IDB Vice President (Finance) Dr. Abdul Aziz Al Hinai, stated that the Islamic Development Bank attaches great significance to the fact that funding should be subject to moral values, and should not be governed by incentives, profit and supply or demand. He underlined that the current global financial crisis was a clear evidence of financial practices
exercised in the absence of moral values and emphasized that under the Islamic law debt was legitimate, but within the constraints of specific controls and safeguards for the rights of the parties involved.
Concluding his statement, Dr. Hinai touched upon the importance of UNCTAD’s initiative on sovereign lending and borrowing and expressed confidence that the views and proposals of the participants in the meeting would contribute to preparing the ground for world economic stability.
UNCTAD representative Mrs. Yuefen Li and former Egyptian finance minister, Dr. Samir Radwan, along with seventeen representatives from Arab countries attended the one day event on promoting principles of sovereign lending and borrowing.
UNCTAD has formed a committee to bring together experts and specialists from the private sector, and observers from the International Monetary Fund, the World Bank and the Paris Club in a bid to develop proposals for encouraging sovereign lending and borrowing. The body is currently on a regional consultation on this initiative and the final outcome will be presented at the thirteenth session of UNCTAD, slated for April 21-26, 2012 in Doha, Qatar.