Africa/Global: Hopes 'Fade' for Millennium Meet

The United Nations summit next month on promoting the millennium development goals could end up delaying progress, a leading British charity says. The UN summit has been called at its headquarters in New York September 14 to 16 to review action on the millennium development goals (MDGs). A draft declaration for a UN text on the MDGs was produced Aug. 5 following proposals made earlier in June by China and other developing nations. "Very few of those amendments were incorporated in the draft text," Peter Hardstaff from the World Development Movement (WDM) told IPS. The review summit next month will now consider several amendments from the United States ''which sound like a complete reversal of even what is in the draft declaration,'' Hardstaff said.