Rome - Pope Benedict XVI has called on the world's leading industrialized nations to maintain and strengthen assistance for poor nations during the world economic crisis, according to information released by the Vatican Saturday. "I appeal to G8 member states ... to maintain and boost development aid, not in spite of the crisis but precisely because this is one of the main solutions to it," the pontiff was quoted as saying in a letter to Italian Prime Minister Silvio Berlusconi.
The annual summit of the Group of Eight (G8) - United States, Britain, Japan, France, Germany, Italy, Russia and Canada - takes place in the Italian city of L'Aquila from July 8-10.
In discussing the issues, G8 leaders should heed the "voice of Africa" and least developed nations and not only those those put forward by "the most important or most economically successful countries," Benedict said.
The G8 should strive towards creating jobs and universal access to education and realising the United Nations Millennium development goals by 2015.
The measures aimed at fighting the global economic downturn should be "ethical," he said.
