Global Policy Forum

Japan on Friday unveiled a new plan to boost its foreign aid budget by $10bn over the next five years to make the country's presence felt as it seeks to win a permanent seat on the UN Security Council. Japanese Prime Minister Junichiro Koizumi announced the plan on the final day of the Group of Eight summit here to reverse the trend of gradual cuts in recent years.

The summit in a final statement said the G8 and other donors would increase development aid to poor countries by about $50bn a year by 2010 compared with 2004. "We will raise ODA (official development assistance) over the next five years ... by $10bn," Koizumi told G8 partners.

Japan extended about $8.9bn in official aid to the world in 2004 and intends to raise the sum by an average of $2bn annually over the next five years. Tokyo had already announced it would double its aid to Africa by the end of 2007.

Japan, Germany, Brazil and India on Wednesday submitted a draft resolution to the United Nations on the controversial expansion of the Security Council for an early vote in the General Assembly.

Koizumi met with leaders of the three other countries of the so-called Group of Four Thursday in the Scottish town of Gleneagles on the sidelines of the G8 gathering. Koizumi, Brazilian President Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva, Indian Prime Minister Manmohan Singh and German Chancellor Gerhard Schroeder "confirmed to maintain G4 solidarity and push (ahead) with (UN) reform," a Japanese government statement said.

China has opposed the reforms as it does not want to give Japan permanent membership on the Security Council, while the United States backs only Japan in an expansion of the prestigious UN seats.

Group of Four foreign ministers will meet on Friday in London, with the venue unchanged despite Thursday's deadly attacks in the British capital, according to a Japanese government official.

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