We are not falling out

By R.C. | SINGAPORE

UNSURPRISINGLY, the main topic of debate yesterday at the World Bank's inaugural “Conference on East Asian Development” in Singapore was the ongoing crisis in Japan. Hundreds of delegates from throughout the region (which includes, for the Bank's purposes, China and Mongolia as well as all the usual suspects) started the day with a minute's silence: a moving tribute to Japan's dead from the earthquake and subsequent tsunami of March 11th.

Altogether, it was an impressive display of pan-Asian sympathy and support. For her part, the main Japanese delegate to the conference, Naoko Ishii, the deputy vice-minister of finance for international affairs, reassured everyone several times that Japan was not about to turn inwards after this disaster, as some people have feared. Far from it, she said, the country is keen to carry on shouldering its regional and international responsibilities as before.