French President Emmanuel Macron assured Wednesday in Bali that Paris “supports the full and complete integration of the African Union into the G20”, in the same way as the European Union is a member, during a press conference.
He felt that this was a “key element” in the recomposition of the “rules of governance of international institutions”. “If we want to take full account of solidarity with the South, we must accept that the African Union, like the European Union, is around the table,” he declared.
The French president also announced the holding “next June in Paris” of an “international conference on a new financial pact with the South”, with the wish to “create the conditions for a real shock of financing towards the South”. because “we must not we cannot ask these countries to support multilateralism, if it is not able to respond to their vital emergencies”.
This will include “taking stock” of the reallocation of IMF special drawing rights (SDRs) from rich to poorer countries. France has “made a commitment, with a few others, to be able to reallocate 30% of our special drawing rights” to “the most fragile countries”, specified the Head of State at the conclusion of the G20 under the Indonesian presidency.
SDRs are a kind of currency created by the IMF. They can be granted by the IMF directly to member countries who can use them either to repay their obligations to the IMF or to adjust their monetary reserves.
Mr. Macron also explained that the G20 meeting on Tuesday and Wednesday had “allowed progress to be made in terms of restructuring the debts of the most fragile countries, which is a key element of solidarity”. “We must get out of the status quo for the poorest countries and massively mobilize the private sector, in any case mobilize it much more for the energy, agricultural and industrial revolution”, by loosening “some of the constraints in the access financing”.
“We must, within the framework of this new financial pact, also integrate the question of climate vulnerability”, insisted the French president. A “group of wise men” on the sidelines of COP27 in Sharm-el-Sheikh in Egypt was “mandated” to “advance technically” on “specific financial mechanisms”, he detailed.