GERMANY: Bono and Bob Geldof push G8 leaders to "keep promises" and work towards halving poverty

Germany will meet these Africans on the beaches of Mallorca and the Canaries and Malta this summer. They'll be dead," Bob Geldof predicted during a news conference in Berlin in Tuesday (May 15). "But you meet them on the beaches. And you will not stop them coming here. And the painful truth is: we need them, too." "But will the social order withstand it?," Geldof asked. "The answer is no. So what do we ask? We ask only what the politicians promised, which is the minimum," Geldof said. In 2005, G8 countries decided to double development aid until 2010 to 50 billion dollars. According to a study by U2 singer Bono's Africa initiative "Data," G8 aid since 2004 was raised to 2.3 billion dollars annually, but 5.4 billion would have been necessary to reach the goal. Aid this year was even lower, the study says, while Japan and Great Britain extended their contributions the most among the world's eight most industrialised nations. A lot of emphasis was put on German Chancellor Angela Merkel's role as host of this year's G8 summit in the Baltic Sea resort of Heilgendamm on June 6-8. Bob Geldof said "if Chancellor Merkel breaks that pride and that honour and that dignity then she betrays the wishes and the word of Germany." "But worse, she kills people too. So you think this is pop stars and the boring subject of aid and Africa. One: it works. The boring pop stars have tried to channel this into a progressive, positive, political platform for change." "The politicians agreed," Geldof reminded listeners. "You must do it.

ITN Source | May 17, 2007

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