Moroccan minister in Washington for WB-IMF meeting and talks with US officials

Moroccan Economy and Finance Minister Fathallah Oualalou is chairing the delegation taking part in the spring meetings of the World Bank and International Monetary Fund, which opened in Washington on Sunday.

The official will also meet US under-secretary for economic affairs, Alan Larson and take part, together with Algerian and Tunisian peers, in a meeting Tuesday with Larson over the US-Maghreban partnership project, known as the "Eizenstat initiative."

The initiative bearing the name of former economic affairs under-secretary Stuart Eizenstat will be debated the same day in a forum by the Overseas Private Investment Corporation" (OPIC). It will also be the main topic of a luncheon-debate at the Washington "Cosmos" Club with active participation by Larson, the Moroccan, Algerian and Tunisian finance ministers and other officials and entrepreneurs.

The project, launched three years ago, is meant to promote economic development, business opportunities and economic and trade cooperation between the United States and North-African countries through incentives to private investment and the advent of a market at the Maghreban scale.

Algeria, Morocco, and Tunisia are gathered, together with Libya and Mauritania, in the Arab Maghreb Union (UMA).