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G8 summit to spotlight energy poverty in third world - official

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STRELNA (near St. Petersburg), July 15 (RIA Novosti) - Lack of energy in the developing world will be spotlighted in the final statement of a Group of Eight summit in St. Petersburg, a Russian deputy finance minister said Saturday.

Energy security is one of three key topics at the three-day summit, which opens Saturday, and global leaders will also discuss efforts to support progress in the developing world that were agreed upon at last year's summit in Gleneagles, Scotland.

"The summit's final documents on energy security will have a special section devoted to energy poverty," Sergei Storchak said. "It is hard to imagine lifting the population of developing countries out of poverty without giving them access to energy."

He said it was important not to boost loans to third-world countries now that many of their debts had been written off.

On June 6, Finance Minister Alexei Kudrin said Russia would write off $700 million worth of debt owed by Heavily Indebted Poor Countries, mainly in Africa.

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