IMF sets central bank meeting in Shanghai Monday

Veronica Smith
AFP

WASHINGTON — The International Monetary Fund on Friday said it will hold a high-level conference of central bank governors in Shanghai next week to discuss ways to address the global financial crisis.

The IMF said the conference, scheduled for Monday, would include central bank chiefs and other officials from Asia, Africa, Europe, and North and South America.

The People’s Bank of China will host the conference, to be co-chaired by the head of the central bank, Zhou Xiaochuan, and IMF managing director Dominique Strauss-Kahn, the Washington-based institution said in a statement.

The US Federal Reserve was expected to be represented by Kevin Warsh, a member of the central bank’s policy-setting Federal Open Market Committee.

The Shanghai conference follows on the heels of last week’s IMF and World Bank annual meetings, where leading finance officials discussed steps to strengthen the global economy’s recovery from the worst recession since World War II and the global financial system.

“The conference is part of the ongoing international examination of the policy challenges posed by the global financial crisis,” the IMF said.

Asked about the last-minute timing of the announcement in Washington, just days before the meeting opens in Shanghai, an IMF spokesman told AFP there was “no urgency surrounding this conference.”

“This was in planning for a number of months,” he said.

In its statement, the 187-nation IMF noted the meeting follows an IMF-sponsored gathering in South Korea of Asian policymakers and opinion leaders in July, at which it “committed to forging a new relationship with the region.”

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