Speed up progress to end world poverty, bishop tells Rice

Published: 2005-09-14

WASHINGTON (CNS) -- The U.N. World Summit of government leaders must "accelerate progress" toward improving conditions in poor countries, said the chairman of the U.S. bishops' Committee on International Policy. Bishop John H. Ricard of Pensacola-Tallahassee, Fla., in a letter to U.S. Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice, expressed concern "that due attention may not be given to the needs of the world's poorest people." The letter was dated Sept. 7 and was released Sept. 13 in Washington by the U.S. bishops' Department of Communications. Government leaders from more than 170 countries planned to attend the Sept. 14-16 summit at U.N. headquarters in New York. While progress is being made in some countries to meet goals established in the 2000 U.N. Millennium Declaration, "it is lagging in others, particularly in Africa," said Bishop Ricard. The declaration established several goals to be met by 2015. The bishop urged greater efforts to achieve several of the goals.

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