British government leads the way against third world arm loans

The British Government will no longer underwrite loans to third world countries to buy British arms, finance Secretary Gordon Brown announced Tuesday.

Brown said that future export credit guarantees will no longer be extended to "unproductive" projects which will not help the development of the country concerned.

Brown made the statement at the British charity "Oxfam," Tuesday.

The move follows Brown's announcement last month that Britain would write off all bilateral debt to 41 of the world's poorest nations once they had internationally agreed to poverty eradication programs.