The director of the International Monetary Fund (IMF), Kristalina Georgieva, warned today that the world economy is threatened by the war between Israel and Hamas in the Gaza Strip and attacks by Houthi rebels on ships near Yemen, which harm traffic through the Suez Canal.
The war in the Gaza Strip has hurt the economy in the Middle East and North Africa, Georgieva said at the 2024 World Government Summit in Dubai, United Arab Emirates.
“I am most afraid of the duration of this conflict because, if it continues, there is a risk of a larger spillover,” said Georgieva at the annual meeting that brings together the business and political world in the Emirates until Wednesday.
At the end of January, the UN Conference on Trade and Development (Unctad) warned that the volume of cargo traffic through the Suez Canal dropped by more than 40 percent in the previous two months, reports Beta.
“If hostilities spread, it could be more problematic for the whole world,” Georgieva said.
The president of the World Bank, Ajay Banga, said that the wars in Gaza and Ukraine and the attacks in the Red Sea are among the biggest challenges to think about when talking about world economic forecasts.
“When you add those variables to what already appears to be likely to be the lowest growth rate in the last 55 years, it has to be carefully monitored,” said the head of the World Bank at a meeting in Dubai.
