Brussels, 08/10/2001 (Agence Europe) - Meeting in Washington on Saturday, the finance ministers and the governors of the central banks of the seven main industrial powers devoted part of their work to the consequences of the 11 September attacks, and above all fine-tuned their strategy for "drying up the financial assets of terrorism". The G7 came to an agreement (with support from Russia, attending part of the meeting) on an action plan comprising the following measures: "more vigorous" application of UN Resolutions 1333 and 1373 calling on all countries to "freeze the funds and assets, not only of Ossama bin Laden and his associates, but also of terrorists throughout the world"; - an exchange of information on suspect bank accounts; - the setting in place of rules of transparency and integrity applicable to all financial markets,, including off-shore centres and other tax havens. The G7 could impose sanctions on the latter if they do not comply with these rules. According to French Finance Minister Laurent Fabius, such sanctions (details of which are not specifically given in the G7 communique) could consist in prohibiting recalcitrant institutions or banks from carrying out their activities in wealthy countries or encouraging the World Bank and the International Monetary Fund to demand that countries with lax legislation adopt the international norms. In addition, the OECD's Financial Action Task Force (FATF), has been given a G7 mandate to extend its scope to cover the fight against the funding of terrorism and to fix transparency norms.
As far as the world economic situation is concerned, the G7 has pledged to "take the necessary measures for increasing growth and protecting the health of the financial markets", without specifying any concerted recovery measure. The ministers simply gave their reassurance. "While taking short term uncertainties into account, we are confident in the outlook for recovery", they state in their press release. US Secretary for the Treasury, Paul O'Neil, explained that each country should take measures to achieve the highest rate of growth. He added that the specific circumstances of each country should determine such measures. The European ministers reminded their American, Canadian and Japanese counterparts that, unlike Washington and Ottawa, they could not practice recovery through budgetary means because of their commitments to reduce public deficit. "There are reasons to be confident and to believe that the slowdown in the euro zone will not last long", said European Central Bank President Wim Duisenberg. He went on to answer the European ministers, who insist on a margin of manoeuvre still available to the ECB for juggling with the level of interest rates: "we believe that our current monetary policy is right for remaining in line with price stability, in so far as no further information contradicts this".