NEW DELHI: The world leaders, who took part in the third Voice of Global South Summit on Saturday expressed concerns over the prevailing tensions and conflicts around the globe and their impact on the developing countries. They called for unity among the Global South partners to meet the aspirations of the member countries, comprising two-third of the humanity. Prime Minister Narendra Modi anchored the summit virtually on Saturday. Global South is a socio-economic- and-politics based grouping of countries, which includes Africa, Latin America and the Caribbean, Asia (excluding Israel, Japan and South Korea) and Oceania (excluding Australia and New Zealand). Speaking at the summit, Prime Minister Modi said that solutions to concerns over global uncertainties depend on a just and inclusive global governance, “such institutions whose priorities give preference to the Global South, where developed countries also fulfill their responsibilities and commitments, take steps to reduce the gap between the Global North and the Global South.” The Summit of the Future at the UN in September could be an important milestone towards this, the PM added. The PM also proposed the creation of a human-centric ‘Global Development Compact’ for the member countries to facilitate trade, technology sharing and concessional financing based on India’s growth journey and in line with the priorities of the developing nations. The needy countries will not be burdened with debt in the name of development finance, Modi assured amid concerns over many countries falling into the Chinese ‘debt trap’ under Beijing’s Belt and Road Initiative. “I would like to propose a comprehensive “Global Development Compact” on behalf of India. The foundation of this Compact will be based on India’s development journey and experiences of development partnership,” Modi said at the closing session.“It will be human-centric and multi-dimensional for development and will promote a multisectoral approach. It will not burden the needy countries with debt in the name of development finance,” he added. Discussions were also held on the contribution of Digital Public Infrastructure (DPI). “DPI’s contribution to inclusive growth is not short of a revolution. The Global DPI Repository, created under India’s G20 presidency, was the first ever multilateral consensus on DPI,” Modi said.Agreements to share the ‘India Stack’ (India’s DPI) have been signed with 12 partners from the Global South. India has created a Social Impact Fund to accelerate DPI in the Global South and will make an initial contribution of $25 million for this.
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