G20 finance ministers pledge to avoid currency war

Moscow - The G20 on Saturday pledged to avoid a "currency war" but failed to criticise Japan for its policy of driving down the yen.

Japan’s approach under new Prime Minister Shinzo Abe, which aims to make its products more competitive abroad, has raised renewed fears of competitive currency devaluations.

The Group of 20 large economies, whose finance ministers and central bankers met in Moscow, said in a final communique they would resist a currency war.

The G20 pledged "to move more rapidly toward more market-determined exchange rate systems and exchange rate flexibility to reflect underlying fundamentals." International Monetary Fund chief Christine Lagarde said that at the IMF "we think that talk of currency wars is overblown." At the G20 meeting "people did talk about their currency worries,"she said in a statement. "The good news is that the G20 responded with cooperation rather than conflict today."//DPA