A/RES/53/175
Page 7
and multilateral financial institutions to continue to extend concessional financial assistance, particularly
to the least developed countries, in order to support the implementation of economic reforms and
stabilization and structural adjustment programmes by the developing countries that will enable them to
extricate themselves from the debt overhang and attract new investment and to assist them in achieving
sustained economic growth and sustainable development, in accordance with the relevant General
Assembly resolutions and recent United Nations conferences, and the eradication of poverty;
33. Also stresses the importance of providing adequate resources for debt relief in the light of the
adverse effects of the current international financial crisis on the mobilization of both domestic and
external resources for the development of the least developed countries and Africa, and welcomes
unilateral debt relief measures from creditor countries on top of the multilaterally agreed debt relief under
the Heavily Indebted Poor Countries Debt Initiative, bearing in mind that such unilateral actions strengthen
the impact of the Initiative as a credible exit solution;
34. Further stresses the need to strengthen the institutional capacity of developing countries in debt
management, and calls upon the international community to support their efforts towards that end;
35. Calls upon the international community, including the United Nations system, and invites the
Bretton Woods institutions, as well as the private sector, to take appropriate measures and actions for the
implementation of the commitments, agreements and decisions of the major United Nations conferences
and summits organized since the beginning of the 1990s on development related to the question of the
external debt problem of developing countries;
36. Notes the various proposals contained in the Trade and Development Report, 1998,7 concerning
the issue of the external debt of African countries, and requests the Secretary-General to report pertinent
developments relating thereto to the General Assembly at its fifty-fourth session;
37. Requests the Secretary-General to report to the General Assembly at its fifty-fourth session on
the implementation of the present resolution.
91st plenary meeting
15 December 1998
7
United Nations publication, Sales No. E.98.II.D.6.