New York - The world's richest governments should draw on their political will to assist poor countries as the amount of bail- out money in developed countries have far exceeded the funds wealthy nations have provided for development in poor ones, UN Secretary General Ban Ki-moon said Tuesday.

Ban will attend the G20 summit in Washington on Saturday even though he had earlier hoped the event would take place at UN headquarters in New York. The summit was pushed by the Bush White House at the urging of European Union governments, which called for reforming the global finance institutions developed after World War II to prevent future economic meltdown.

Ban said he plans to present three messages. The G20 should do all it can to help alleviate the impact of the financial crisis on the world's poorest and most vulnerable people, he said.

"This is a question of will," he said.

"Second, we need to address the systemic roots of the crisis," he said. "Third, the crisis is also an opportunity to address climate change. At a time of growing economic hardship, green growth can create millions of jobs."

The United States has shored up banks and investment companies hurt by the credit crunch with a whopping 700 billion dollars, while European governments were also pumping hundreds of billions of dollars into their economies to prevent collapse.

Rich countries have donated annually 50 billion dollars to development in poor countries, while the UN has called for tripling that amount to meet urgent needs caused by high food and energy prices.

The UN has called for eradicating poverty and hunger by 2015, but that goal may not be attained because of the financial crisis. (dpa)