Accra, June 8, GNA- President John Agyekum Kufuor's invitation to the G8 Summit is an opportunity for him to push his African agenda forward. Mr Kwabena Agyei Agyepong, Press Secretary to the President, who made this assertion said President Kufuor's agenda for Africa at the Summit was more trade for Africa to get into the mainstream of globalisation. The assertion was contained in a statement issued by the Office of the Press Secretary in Accra on Tuesday.

The statement said: " President Kufuor together with five other African leaders at the Summit would discuss how to co-operate to accelerate private sector led growth and development in Africa".

Mr Agyepong said, " Africa contributes 1.5 per cent of Foreign Direct Investments (FDI) of the world economy and has been marginalized in terms of world trade. It is high time the world brought Africa back into the mainstream of the world economy".

He said this could be possible when Africans had better access to the world market, better and fair terms of trade to ensure that subsidies given to western farmers did not displace African peasant farmers out of the world economy.
Mr Agyepong said President Kufuor would also put the prevalent rate of HIV/AIDS in Ghana before the Summit to enable her benefit from US President George W. Bush's 15 million dollars emergency account to fight the menace in Africa.
The Summit is scheduled for Georgia, USA on June 10.

G-8 summit opens in US

SAVANNAH, United States, June 8 -- The 2004 summit of the Group of the Eight (G-8) opened here in an informal setting inSea Island, the southeastern US state of Georgia, on Tuesday evening with a social dinner hosted by US President George W. Bushfor his seven counterparts from major western industrialized nations and the European Union.

The three-day annual summit, the 30th of its kind, brings leaders from Canada, France, Germany, Italy, Japan, Russia, Britain and the United States to discuss a wide range of issues such as Iraq, the war on terror and proliferation, with focus on Bush's broader Middle East plan.

The European Union also attends the G-8 summit, represented by Romano Prodi, president of the European Commission, and the prime minister of Ireland, which is holding the rotating presidency of the European Union.

Bush will hold bilateral meetings with leaders of Japan, Germany, Russia and Canada respectively on Wednesday.

G-8 leaders would agree to launch many new initiatives "to advance freedom" by strengthening international cooperation, Condoleezza Rice, Bush's national security adviser, said Monday.

They are expected to take new actions to promote freedom, democracy and prosperity in the broader Middle East, to counter the proliferation of weapons of mass destruction and to counter the proliferation of weapons of mass destruction, and discuss the war on terror, global peacekeeping efforts, global economy and trade, poverty, health, famine and environment, she said.

Leaders from Afghanistan, Algeria, Bahrain, Jordan, Yemen and Turkey are invited to attend the G-8 Summit on Wednesday, with theIraq issue expected to be core issue.

On Thursday, G-8 leaders will have lunch with African leaders from Algeria, Ghana, Nigeria, Senegal, South Africa, and Uganda todiscuss topics like famine/food, security, peacekeeping, development and HIV/AIDS.

This year's summit features a keen interest of American officials in inviting journalists to interview US administration officials, on topics ranging from AIDS/HIV to debt relief for African countries, and from the war on terror to international security.

As Bush has designated all summit venues National Security Special Event sites, security for the summit has been particularlytight this year.

Some 20,000 police and security agents were reportedly mobilized to secure the Sea Island, the meeting place for summit, and some of them received anti-terror and anti-riot training one year ago.

The US Federal Aviation Administration has closed the air spacewithin a 65 km radius of Sea Island, and the restriction will remain effective until Friday, June 11, with permission given onlyto US military planes and helicopters and those flown by law-enforcement agencies.

One of the biggest concerns of the organizers is how to protectthe participants from terrorist attacks. US authorities announced last month that terrorists were planning a major attack on the United States this summer with the summit as a possible target. Enditem