Cameron Again Highlights Transparency for G-8 Agenda

28 January 2013

British Prime Minister David Cameron continues to emphasize transparency as a theme for the June meeting of the G-8 nations in Ireland.

Cameron expanded slightly on this agenda during a speech at the World Economic Forum in Davos, Switzerland.

“The third big push of our agenda is on transparency, shining a light on company ownership, land ownership and where money flows from and to,” he said.

“I want this G8 to lead a big push for transparency across the developing world,” he said later in the speech. He used greater transparency for oil revenues in Nigeria as an example of the potential benefits of transparency.

The G-8 leaders in recent years have pledged countries in joining the Open Government Partnership and endorsed mandatory disclosure of extractive industry payments to governments.

Cameron appears to have in mind a broader agenda.  

“So we’re going to push for more transparency on who owns companies, on who’s buying up land and for what purpose, on how governments spend their money, on how gas, oil and mining companies operate, on who is hiding stolen assets and how we recover and return them.”

It remains to be seen if his transparency emphasis will be applied to the work of the G-8 itself. (See previous FreedomInfo.org report.)

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