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Lula: Global financial crisis caused by white people
(Xinhua/Agencies)
Updated: 2009-03-27 10:21

LONDON --Brazil's President Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva said on Thursday that "the global financial crisis was caused by white people with blue eyes."


Brazil's President Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva shake hands with British Prime Minister Gordon Brown before a meeting at the Alvorada Palace in Brasilia March 26, 2009.  [Agencies]
The Brazilian president made the comments while meeting Gordon Brown, who is visiting Brazil as part of his tour to try to forge a global consensus on how to save the worldwide economy.

The Brazilian president's comment was described by Downing Street as remarks "meant for domestic consumption."

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Brown told reporters after the meeting that he will urge G20 leaders to back a multi-billion pound fund to reverse a slide in world trade.

"I'm going to ask the G20 summit next week to support a global expansion of trade finance of at least US$100 billion to help revive trade in all parts of the world," Brown said.

Along with the trade stimulus plan, the Prime Minister said he wanted to see global standards on salaries in the finance sector.

The British prime minister's visit to Brazil where he listened to the "white people with blue eyes" comments came just one day after Czech Prime Minister Mirek Topolanek criticism of President Barack Obama's fiscal stimulus package.

The Czech leader said on a European Parliament meeting on Wednesday that the financial bail-out is "a way to hell."

Topolanek said that the biggest success of last week's EU summit was its refusal to copy the US example.

At the end of EU summit in Brussels last week, EU leaders insisted that the EU's existing stimulus measures -- put at about 400 billion euros -- had to be given time to kick in, while President Obama is facing a tough fight to win support from the Congress for his draft US$3.6 trillion budget.

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