G8 should give emerging states more say -EU draft

By Huw Jones

BRUSSELS (Reuters) - Reforms of the Group of Eight (G8) club of major industrialised nations must be studied to give emerging countries more say, European Union president France has proposed to the bloc's finance ministers.

"Further reform of the G8 should be considered to make this group more inclusive of emerging countries," the document, obtained by Reuters before it is due to be discussed at a regular meeting in Brussels next Tuesday, said.

The document is key to formulating the EU's position for the G20 summit to be held in Washington on November 15 to apply globally the lessons learnt from the worst financial market crisis since the Great Depression.

It proposes reforms of institutions that manage the global financial market and of individual market participants such as credit rating agencies, accounting rules-setters, banks and their top management.

The fundamental aim is to curb "short-termism" in financial markets, improve accountability and responsibility, anticipate risk better and increase transparency, the document said.

Several leaders such as British Prime Minister Gordon Brown and French President Nicolas Sarkozy want a "Bretton Woods"-style reworking of supervision of global capital markets.

The Bretton Woods institutions are the World Bank and the International Monetary Fund, set up after the Second World War.

The two are dominated by G8 members -- the United States, Russia, Japan, Canada, Britain, France, Germany and Italy -- even though a country like China now has a bigger economy than many of them.