Economic forum looks for causes of terrorism

NEW YORK -- For a gathering of the rich and powerful, the World Economic Forum is spending a lot of time focusing on the poor and weak.

Presidents and kings, sultans and billionaires heard strong warnings in the World Economic Forum's first two days that wealthy nations must take responsibility to ease the suffering of the developing world.

Attendees are discussing U.S. foreign policy, its possible role in breeding terrorism and the down sides of globalization -- all key issues for protest groups that planned to march down Lexington Avenue on Saturday to the forum's site at the Waldorf-Astoria Hotel.

There were few demonstrations on a rainy Friday, and protests generally have remained orderly. But the forum's Web site crashed Friday morning, and three groups of cyber-activists claimed responsibility. It was still disabled Friday night, but was up and running again Saturday morning.

The meeting of 2,700 business and political leaders from around the world is being held in New York partly to show solidarity with the city following the Sept. 11 terror attacks. And though there has been no shortage of expensive parties and gourmet meals, sessions have been dominated by serious talk of terrorism, poverty and anti-Western anger.

Such resentment was expected to be visible Saturday, when anti-globalization protesters planned their biggest demonstrations. Thousands of police officers were on alert.

At the conference Saturday morning, Microsoft chairman Bill Gates and Bono, the lead singer of the rock group U2, planned to call on governments and corporations to substantially increase their contributions for global health programs.

"Expert consensus is developing that increasing health spending is essential not only to improving the health of the world's poorest people but also to promoting economic and social progress," Gates said in a prepared statement before addressing forum participants with Bono.

'A moral outrage'

The two said money is needed in particular to provide more funding in Africa to combat malaria and AIDS, and the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation announced it would donate $50 million to help prevent the spread of HIV.

"It is an international scandal and a moral outrage that clear plans to put kids in school, train nurses and provide essential medicines are not being funded," Bono said in his prepared remarks.

Protesters say the forum's discussions are simple lip service. They contend that wealthy countries exploit poorer ones by pressuring them to remove protective trade barriers and by allowing multinational corporations to dominate their fragile economies.

But attendees at the forum, which runs through Monday, professed a new urgency about fighting poverty and a better understanding of the way it sowed extremism in countries like Afghanistan.

On Friday, Secretary of State Colin Powell said solving poverty would be part of the anti-terror campaign.

"We have to show people who might move in the direction of terrorism that there is a better way," he said.

But helping countries overcome their troubles isn't always easy, Treasury Secretary Paul O'Neill said.

"Over the last 50 years, hundreds of billions have been spent in the name of economic development, with so many of the countries that have been major recipients still not showing strong evidence of positive change," he said.