- France: provisional statistics published by the French government and the Bank of France show a clear shakeout of the market in direct foreign investment in France. A fall of EUR 2.4 bn for May as opposed to EUR 3 bn in April and EUR 1.9 bn in March. There was also a reduction in investments of almost EUR 4 bn in the first five months of 2002 (EUR 14.6 bn) compared to the same period in 2001 (EUR 18.3 bn), which corresponds to a fall of 20%. At the same time, French investments abroad almost fell by half during the first five months of the year over the same period in 2001 - EUR 23.5 bn this year as opposed to EUR 42.7 bn a year before. The slowdown in acquisitions abroad can explain this downward trend. - South-East Europe: Eight South-Eastern European countries (Albania, Bosnia-Herzegovina, Bulgaria, Croatia, Macedonia, Moldavia, Romania and the Federal Republic of Yugoslavia (Serbia and Montenegro) have signed a common declaration laying out the "the fundamental principles and exemplary practices for attracting private investment in the region", under the auspices of the Stability Pact Charter for investment co-presided by the OECD and the Austrian Minister for the Economy. Signatories are committed to greater transparency, clarity and stability in their regulation and equal treatment of local and foreign investors, as well as the simplification of administrative procedures and the fight against corruption in the public administrations. Austrian Minister for the Economy, Martin Bartenstein stressed on this occasion, that South-East Europe had won USD 4.4 bn in foreign investments last year, a figure that is higher than previous years but still insufficient for meeting the needs of the region. This 4.4 bn "represents only 0.6% of all global investments", stressed Mr Bartenstein. - Pakistan: the Pakistani government has indicated that direct foreign investment increased by 50% last year. These investments have in fact reached an amount of USD 484.7 million during the twelve months between June 2001 and June 2002, as opposed to USD 322.4 million a year before. US investors have been particularly active with USD 326.4 million invested out of the 484.7 million overall, way ahead of the British USD 30.36 million. The Pakistani authorities believe that their support for the war on terrorism is directly linked to renewed investor interest.