Economic 'snub’ angers Italy

Press, 24 February 1987, Page 10

Economic 'snub’ angers Italy

NZPA-Reuter Rome Italy has called for swift clarification of its status among the leading industrial nations, charging that it was snubbed at the Group of Seven meeting in Paris and that this could jeopardise an economic summit meeting set for Venice in June.

The Treasury Minister, Giovanni Goria, and central bank governor, Carlo Ciampi, pulled out of a meeting yesterday which also grouped Finance Ministers from the United States, Japan, Britain, West Germany, France and Canada.

They said Italy had been reduced to playing a superfluous role after being excluded from an earlier planning meeting attended by the smaller Group of Five (G-5).

An aide to the Socialist Prime Minister, Bettino Craxi, told Reuters that Italy viewed its exclusion as a snub and a serious violation of an agreement reached at last May’s Tokyo summit meeting.

The summit seven agreed that Italy and Canada could attend future G--5 talks on manipulating currency and Interest rate movements whenever a G-5 decision affected

them. “We are asking for clarification and if this is not forthcoming there will be no Venice meeting,” said Antonio Badini, diplomatic adviser to Mr Craxi. Mr Badini said the Group of Five, from which Canada and Italy have traditionally been excluded, were clinging to an out-dated privilege that was no longer consistent with Italy’s str<

jy’s strong economic and industrial growth of the last few years. Political sources said the government wanted the situation cleared up swiftly, certainly before the meeting of the International Monetary Fund in April. The Group of Five pledged at their meeting to “co-operate closely to foster stability of exchange rates around current levels.”

The trading surplus nations, Japan and West Germany, pledged to stimulate their economies so that they absorb more United States and other foreign goods — something that the Americans have been demanding that they should do — in return for getting the United States to say it would cooperate on shoring up the dollar.