At Paris summit, World Bank unveils debt payment pause for disaster-hit countries

Some 40 leaders, including about a dozen from Africa, China's prime minister and Brazil's president, were in the French capital alongside international organisations at the "Summit for a New Global Financial Pact".

In remarks to a panel on Thursday, new World Bank president Ajay Banga outlined a "toolkit", including offering a pause in debt repayments, giving countries flexibility to redirect funds for emergency response, providing new types of insurance to help development projects and helping governments build advance-emergency systems.

While the new World Bank measures are designed to give developing nations some breathing space, there was no discussion of multilateral lenders offering debt writedowns - so-called haircuts. French President Emmanuel Macron, hosting the summit, said it was time to act or trust would be lost. Africa's debt woes are coupled with the dual challenge faced by some of the world's poorest countries of tackling the impacts of climate change while adapting to the green transition.

In particular, there is expected to be an announcement at the Paris meeting that a $100 billion target has been met for new funds made by rechannelling rich countries' special drawing rights at the International Monetary Fund to vulnerable countries, officials said.

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