Several agencies have reported that the Chinese foreign ministry issued a statement that it was planning to create a $10 billion “investment cooperation fund” for ASEAN, plus offer $15 billion in creadig. The investmet fund will promote infrastructural development linking China with the ASEAN countries. In addition, it was planning to offer 270 million yuan ($40 million) in aid to Cambodia, Laos and Burma. (Some reports specify that this is “new aid,” but from past experience I suspect that the statement is probably ambiguous on this.)
In some of the countries, this puts China into competition with the IMF, which as usual has negotiated loans conditional on strict monetary criteria.
