By IANS,
Brussels : French President Nicolas Sarkozy said Tuesday he would urge India and China during the Asia-Europe Meeting (ASEM) to participate in global meetings for finding solutions to the ongoing financial crisis, EuAsiaNews reported.
The US and Europe have proposed various summits in mid-November to look at new global governance and new regulations, Sarkozy told the European Parliament in the French city of Strasbourg.
“Who will take part in this summit? There are a lot of different schools. I believe the most straightforward thing would be the G8, obviously with Russia. We need to add the G5 to that, obviously with China and India,” Sarkozy said.
“With (European Commission) President (Jose Manuel) Barroso, we are going to visit China, the aim being also to convince China and India to take part in this summit,” said Sarkozy, whose country current holds the rotating EU presidency.
“This is a global crisis so the response can only be global,” stressed the French president.
The seventh ASEM summit in Beijing Friday-Saturday will formally admit six new members – India, Bulgaria, Mongolia, Pakistan, Romania and the ASEAN (Association of the Southeast Asian Nations) Secretariat – taking the membership to 45.
The theme of the Beijing summit is “Vision and Action – Towards a Win-Win Solution”.
Founded in 1996, ASEM has been a multilateral channel for communication between Asia and Europe.
Between 2000 and 2007, EU exports to 16 Asian countries in ASEM rose from 146 billion euros to 228 billion euros, while imports increased from 285 billion euros to 459 billion euros.