Foreign ministers of the Group of 77 (G77) plus China kicked off a meeting on Monday to lay groundwork for a summit mainly on economic cooperation among developing countries and the alliance's ties with the rest of the world.

"We are confronted to three types of concerns dealing respectively with the current status of international economic cooperation, our contribution to such cooperation as regards the countries of the south and in particular the place of the south in the world of today," Qatari Foreign Minister Sheikh Hamad Bin Jassim Bin Jabir al-Thani told the opening ceremony of the ministerial meeting.

"The question now being raised is whether our partners have been up to their own commitment. The answer is no, if we take into account the intensive discussions which took place in New York in the framework of preparations for the review of the implementation of the Millenium Declaration," he said.

"Given that globalization is generally skewed in favor of developed countries and that the effectively integration of the economies of developing countries in international trade and economic exchanges is still in expectation and that the content of development-related negotiations in the World Trade Organization is not clearly defined," he said.

During the summit due on Wednesday and Thursday, leaders from the G77 and China will explore ways to strengthen South-South cooperation, in addition to discussions on North-South ties and UN reform.

The G77, founded in 1964, now groups 134 developing countries.

Source: Xinhua