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Tunisia and Egypt attend summit for richest nations in Deauville G8 offers $20bn to aid Arab democracies

By George Parker and Stanley Pignal in Deauville

Published: May 27 2011 12:44 | Last updated: May 27 2011 12:44

Tunisia and Egypt could be offered more than $20bn in international loans if they continue their transformation into “democratic and tolerant societies”, the leaders of the world’s richest countries announced on Friday.

In a gesture of western solidarity, Tunisia and Egypt were invited to the Group of Eight summit in Deauville, where a draft final communiqué declared: “Democracy lays the best path to peace, stability, prosperity, shared growth and development.”

The G8 said that more than $20bn dollars would be made available by multilateral development banks to Tunisia and Egypt from 2011-13, while the US, European Union and other wealthy economies will make additional bilateral aid available.

The launch of the so-called “Deauville Partnership” between the west and emerging democracies of the Arab uprising was seen as the most concrete outcome of the two-day summit on the Normandy coast.

The G8 communique confirmed a new role in north Africa for the European Bank of Reconstruction and Development, which helped to rebuild former Soviet bloc countries over the last 20 years.

The World Bank, European Investment Bank and African Development Bank are among the bodies that will also pump money into the region. The International Monetary Fund says in a note requested by the G8 that oil importing Arab countries will need $160bn of external financing in the next three years.

Meanwhile Qatar has been talking to oil-rich Gulf partners about to creating a Middle East Development Bank to support Arab states in transitions to democracy.

“The changes under way in the Middle East and north Africa are historic and have the potential to open the door to the kind of transformation that occurred in central and eastern Europe after the fall of the Berlin Wall,” the G8 leaders proclaimed.

The communiqué offered similar support to Iran’s people if they pushed for reforms in their country, but made clear that the offer of western aid was contingent on genuine progress in the region towards democracy and open societies.

David Cameron, Britain’s prime minister, said before the G8 meeting in France: “The most powerful nations on earth have come together and are saying to all those in the Middle East and north Africa who want greater democracy, freedom and civil rights: we are on your side.”

However, the scale of the aid on offer is constrained by the fiscal situations at home in the G8 members: the US, Germany, France, Britain, Canada, Russia, Japan and Italy. Public opposition to aid programmes is hardening in some countries.

For example, Britain is offering help to the region of £110m ($180m) over four years, including £10m a year to promote democracy and help build new political parties – a figure not greatly in excess of the biggest bank bonuses in the City of London.

Earlier this week, Hamad bin Jassem, the Qatari prime minister, referred to a new Arab lending institution in a lecture at the Oxford Centre for Islamic Studies. “There is a multitude of reasons that justify the establishment of the Middle East Development Bank, including the lack of economic diversity, added to the high rate of unemployment among the youth sector,” he said. “Through this bank local resources and capabilities can be mobilised and foreign expertise can be solicited.”

Conservative monarchies of the Gulf have been uneasy about the spread of pro-democracy protests across the region, but they could be embarrassed if they stand back while the west takes steps to financially back democratic transitions.http://www.ft.com/cms/s/0/aa9e92ca-884e-11e0-a1c3-00144feabdc0.html#ixzz1QUlHcwsw

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