Norway offers to make financial resources available to the IMF

The Norwegian Minister of Finance Kristin Halvorsen Friday sent a letter to the Managing Director of the International Monetary Fund (IMF) offering to make additional financial resources available to the Fund. The letter also contains information on Norway's positions regarding the upcoming G20-meeting.

"Balance of payment support to countries that are especially hard hit by economic crisis is a core task for the IMF. Financial support from the IMF is important also for our neighbouring countries, for instance Iceland and Latvia. The profound international crisis calls for an IMF with adequate lending capacity. It is natural for Norway, who has considerable international reserves, to contribute to this end," says finance minister Kristin Halvorsen. 

"Norway's offer has a scope of up to 30 billion Norwegian kroner," Halvorsen says.

The resource situation in the international finance institutions is among the main topics of the G20 Leaders Summit in London on 2 April. The need to secure lending capacity of the IMF is especially attracting attention.

• The letter is available here
• Information from Norges Bank
• Statement by IMF Managing Director Dominique Strauss-Kahn