Finance ministers from around the globe are trying to cobble together international standards for cutting off terrorist funds, the biggest issue of a meeting moved to Canada amid security concerns in the wake of the Sept. 11 attacks.
The Group of 20 meeting officially began with a Friday night dinner, although participants held several private meetings and news conferences earlier in the day.
Policy-making bodies of the International Monetary Fund and the World Bank will also hold talks in Ottawa this weekend after the terrorism attacks postponed a meeting they had planned for late September in Washington.
PHOTO: AP
Security was tight in the heart of Canada's capital, where police have blockaded downtown streets surrounding the venues of the meeting.
Several hundred anti-globalization protesters roamed downtown streets on Friday.
Some smashed the windows of a McDonald's restaurant and knocked down barriers at one spot along the security perimeter. Four people were arrested, and five were reported injured.
More protests were expected yesterday, but police expect fewer numbers than the tens of thousands during April's Summit of the Americas in Quebec City. Local activists say the Sept. 11 attacks have caused them to reconsider protest methods.
During the weekend meetings, participants are focusing on how to crack down on terrorist assets, searching for a set of standards acceptable to major powers such as the US and other nations such as Turkey, Indonesia and Saudi Arabia.
In a luncheon speech Friday, Canadian Finance Minister Paul Martin said richer countries should help poorer nations carry out a coordinated, international fight against terrorists.
"Tracking networks of terrorist funding is a challenge for the most powerful of nations," he said. "Imagine, therefore, how overwhelmed small or impoverished states will find the task without financial and technical assistance."
While major US allies such as Canada have joined Washington in seizing and freezing assets of terrorists, it may be harder to see similar action from Islamic nations, said Sherman Katz, an international business expert at the Center for Strategic and International Studies in Washington.
``The weak ones are the Saudi Arabias of the world,'' he said.
Mexican Finance Secretary Francisco Gil Diaz indicated support for the US call to crack down on terrorist funding, saying he expected a "good result" from the meetings.
"The only way to achieve success is by working together," he said.
Finance ministers also are expected to talk about how the sluggish global economy will affect their nations.
"Every country has to have its objective economic growth, and then also has to recognize their responsibility for economic growth, not only nationally, but in fact internationally," Martin said.
The G20, created in 1999 to address international financial concerns, represents the EU and 19 nations: Argentina, Australia, Brazil, Canada, China, France, Germany, India, Indonesia, Italy, Japan, Mexico, Russia, Saudi Arabia, South Africa, South Korea, Turkey, the UK and the US.
The government is aiming to recruit 1,096 foreign English teachers and teaching assistants this year, the Ministry of Education said yesterday. The foreign teachers would work closely with elementary and junior-high instructors to create and teach courses, ministry official Tsai Yi-ching (蔡宜靜) said. Together, they would create an immersive language environment, helping to motivate students while enhancing the skills of local teachers, she said. The ministry has since 2021 been recruiting foreign teachers through the Taiwan Foreign English Teacher Program, which offers placement, salary, housing and other benefits to eligible foreign teachers. Two centers serving northern and southern Taiwan assist in recruiting and training
WIDE NET: Health officials said they are considering all possibilities, such as bongkrekic acid, while the city mayor said they have not ruled out the possibility of a malicious act of poisoning Two people who dined at a restaurant in Taipei’s Far Eastern Department Store Xinyi A13 last week have died, while four are in intensive care, the Taipei Department of Health said yesterday. All of the outlets of Malaysian vegetarian restaurant franchise Polam Kopitiam have been ordered to close pending an investigation after 11 people became ill due to suspected food poisoning, city officials told a news conference in Taipei. The first fatality, a 39-year-old man who ate at the restaurant on Friday last week, died of kidney failure two days later at the city’s Mackay Memorial Hospital. A 66-year-old man who dined
‘CARRIER KILLERS’: The Tuo Chiang-class corvettes’ stealth capability means they have a radar cross-section as small as the size of a fishing boat, an analyst said President Tsai Ing-wen (蔡英文) yesterday presided over a ceremony at Yilan County’s Suao Harbor (蘇澳港), where the navy took delivery of two indigenous Tuo Chiang-class corvettes. The corvettes, An Chiang (安江) and Wan Chiang (萬江), along with the introduction of the coast guard’s third and fourth 4,000-tonne cutters earlier this month, are a testament to Taiwan’s shipbuilding capability and signify the nation’s resolve to defend democracy and freedom, Tsai said. The vessels are also the last two of six Tuo Chiang-class corvettes ordered from Lungteh Shipbuilding Co (龍德造船) by the navy, Tsai said. The first Tuo Chiang-class vessel delivered was Ta Chiang (塔江)
EYE ON STRAIT: The US spending bill ‘doubles security cooperation funding for Taiwan,’ while also seeking to counter the influence of China US President Joe Biden on Saturday signed into law a US$1.2 trillion spending package that includes US$300 million in foreign military financing to Taiwan, as well as funding for Taipei-Washington cooperative projects. The US Congress early on Saturday overwhelmingly passed the Further Consolidated Appropriations Act 2024 to avoid a partial shutdown and fund the government through September for a fiscal year that began six months ago. Under the package, the Defense Appropriations Act would provide a US$27 billion increase from the previous fiscal year to fund “critical national defense efforts, including countering the PRC [People’s Republic of China],” according to a summary