Brazilian President Luiz InacioLula da Silva on Saturday urged the developed countries to resolve their own problems, saying this is the best solution to preventing the current financial crisis from spreading.

"The best solution for the crisis not to spread is that rich countries resolve their problems. For the first time the problems are not in the poor countries, they are in the rich countries," said President Lula, who was here attending the Summit on Financial Markets and the World Economy.

"It doesn't help to look for palliative measures if you don't resolve chronic problems of the economic policy of America and economic policy of the EU," he told reporters before joining other leaders of the Group of 20 (G20) in a five-hour formal summit meeting in downtown Washington D.C. on Saturday.

The G20, founded in 1999, comprises 19 countries -- Argentina, Australia, Brazil, Britain, Canada, China, France, Germany, India, Indonesia, Italy, Japan, Mexico, Russia, Saudi Arabia, South Africa, South Korea, Turkey and the United States -- and the European Union. The group accounts for 85 percent to 90 percent of the world's GDP and about two-thirds of the world's population.

Lula, who is the acting president of the G20, also called for a fairer regulation of the global financial system and the world economy.

"Today, someone can become a billionaire without producing a single piece of paper, a single job, without producing a single salary. For this, we need serious regulation of coming from the G20," the Brazilian president said.

He stressed that the Group of Eight (G8), which comprises the United States, Japan, Germany, France, Britain, Italy, Canada and Russia, is no longer relevant in a globalized world today and the G20 should play a major role in formulating international financial regulations.

"We are talking about the G20 because the G8 doesn't have anymore reason to exist, in other words, the emerging economies have to be taken into consideration in today's globalized world," he said.

At the five-hour formal summit meeting on Saturday, President Lula continued to elaborate on this point of view.

"The existing multilateral organizations and the international rules in place were rejected by history. Both the International Monetary Fund and the World Bank should open themselves to bigger participation of developing economies," he said in his 15-minute speech at the summit.

"This means more of a voice, representation and a vote for developing countries," Lula said.

Speaking to reporters following the summit, Brazilian Finance Minister Guido Mantega expressed satisfaction that Brazil has achieved many of its stated goals in the Washington financial summit.

"We have reached our goal of establishing the G20 at the presidential level," the minister said. "The (financial) crisis makes things viable that weren't possible before."

Before the Washington summit, the G20 has been serving as an international forum of finance ministers and central bank governors from its member economies. The Summit on Financial Markets and the World Economy marks the first time that the G20 is holding a heads-of-state meeting in view of the worst economic crisis since the 1930s.

(Xinhua News Agency November 16, 2008)