Brazil says IMF reforms key to helping countries in need

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Brazil says IMF reforms key to helping countries in need

By Jason Lange and Asher Levine

(Reuters) - Approval of reforms at the International Monetary Fund is key to helping countries in need such as Ukraine, Brazilian Finance Minister Guido Mantega said on Monday, in a call for Washington to ratify changes agreed upon in 2010.

Speaking to reporters after meeting U.S. Treasury Secretary Jack Lew in Sao Paulo, Mantega said the so-called quota reforms are essential to build up the global lender's war chest. The quotas represent the size of a country's stake in and financial contribution to the IMF.

Brazil and other big developing economies including China and Russia have expressed frustration at the U.S. Congress' failure to ratify a package of reforms that would increase their influence in the IMF.

"We need to conclude (the reforms) so that we have a new distribution of quotas and to strengthen the IMF," Mantega said.

"It is important that we keep strengthening the IMF so it can fulfill its role of helping countries in need, like Ukraine."

Russia is pushing the IMF to move ahead with the reforms without the United States, in a direct challenge to the fund's largest shareholder, which has veto power over major decisions....Although Brazil has not taken a position on Russia's attempt to isolate the United States at the IMF, it has insisted that Washington honor its 2010 promise to approve the reforms.

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http://www.reuters.com/article/2014/03/17/us-brazil-mantega-imf-idUSBREA2G1R020140317

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