May 20, 2011 journal, International Monetary Fund chief arrested for rape, New York May 15 could get 25 years, Dominique Strauss-Kahn spent the night in a Harlem jail and is denied bail. The IMF leadership may now swing over to the Oriental side of the world. Tabloids in New York and Europe have gone wild over the IMF chief's rapid departure. Some blame Nicholas for setting him up but the authorities say no way, devil in the DNA. Strauss Kahn rushed out of the hotel leaving his cellphone behind and was arrested on a Air France jetliner bound for Paris 10 minutes before takeoff thanks to quick New York Police action. The 32 year-old lady he raped was a African immigrant hotel housekeeper. Here is a Wikipedia description of the mysterious International Monetary Fund operation. Salary for the chief of IMF headquartered in Washington D.C. is reported as $500,000. That varmint forced that lady to perform oral sex on him, IMF employees are outraged. "The International Monetary Fund (IMF) is the intergovernmental organization that oversees the global financial system by following the macroeconomic policies of its member countries, in particular those with an impact on exchange rate and the balance of payments. Its objectives are to stabilize international exchange rates and facilitate development through the encouragement of liberalizing economic policies [1] in other countries as a condition of loans, debt relief, and aid.[2] It also offers loans with varying levels of conditionality, mainly to poorer countries. Its headquarters are in Washington, D.C. The IMF's relatively high influence in world affairs and development has drawn heavy criticism from some sources.[3][4] IMF "Headquarters 1" in Washington, D.C. The International Monetary Fund was conceived in July 1944 originally with 45 members and came into existence in December 1945 when 29 countries signed the agreement,[5] with a goal to stabilize exchange rates and assist the reconstruction of the world's international payment system. Countries contributed to a pool which could be borrowed from, on a temporary basis, by countries with payment imbalances. The IMF was important when it was first created because it helped the world stabilize the economic system. The IMF works to improve the economies of its member countries.[6] The IMF describes itself as "an organization of 187 countries (as of July 2010), working to foster global monetary cooperation, secure financial stability, facilitate international trade, promote high employment and sustainable economic growth, and reduce poverty." http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/International_Monetary_Fund "The members of the IMF are the 186 of the UN members and Kosovo.[8][9] Former members are Cuba (which left in 1964) and [10] Taiwan (which was expelled in 1980 for political reasons).[11] The other nonmembers are North Korea, Andorra, Monaco, Liechtenstein, Nauru, Cook Islands, Niue, Vatican City, and the rest of the states with limited recognition. All member states participate directly in the IMF. Member states are represented on a 24-member executive board (five executive directors are appointed by the five members with the largest quotas, nineteen executive directors are elected by the remaining members), and all members appoint a governor to the IMF's board of governors.[12] All members of the IMF are also IBRD members and vice versa. The International Monetary Fund was conceived in July 1944 during the United Nations Monetary and Financial Conference. The representatives of 45 governments met in the Mount Washington Hotel in the area of Bretton Woods, New Hampshire, United States, with the delegates to the conference agreeing on a framework for international economic cooperation.[13] The IMF was formally organized on December 27, 1945, when the first 29 countries signed its Articles of Agreement. The statutory purposes of the IMF today are the same as when they were formulated in 1943 (see #Assistance and reforms). The IMF's influence in the global economy steadily increased as it accumulated more members. The number of IMF member countries has more than quadrupled from the 44 states involved in its establishment, reflecting in particular the attainment of political independence by many developing countries and more recently the collapse of the Soviet bloc. The expansion of the IMF's membership, together with the changes in the world economy, have required the IMF to adapt in a variety of ways to continue serving its purposes effectively. In 2008, faced with a revenue shortfall, the International Monetary Fund's executive board agreed to sell part of the IMF's gold reserves. On April 27, 2008, IMF Managing Director Dominique Strauss-Kahn welcomed the board's decision of April 7, 2008, to propose a new framework for the fund, designed to close a projected $400 million budget deficit over the next few years. The budget proposal includes sharp spending cuts of $100 million until 2011 that will include up to 380 staff dismissals.[14] At the 2009 G-20 London summit, it was decided that the IMF would require additional financial resources to meet prospective needs of its member countries during the ongoing global financial crisis. As part of that decision, the G-20 leaders pledged to increase the IMF's supplemental cash tenfold to $500 billion, and to allocate to member countries another $250 billion via Special Drawing Rights.[15][16] On October 23, 2010, the ministers of finance of G-20, governing most of the IMF member quotas, agreed to reform IMF and shift about 6 percent of the voting shares to major developing nations and countries with emerging markets.[17] As of August 2010 Romania ($13.9 billion), Ukraine ($12.66 billion), Hungary ($11.7 billion), and Greece ($30 billion) are the largest borrowers of the fund.[18] In 1995 the International Monetary Fund began work on data dissemination standards with the view of guiding IMF member countries to disseminate their economic and financial data to the public. The International Monetary and Financial Committee (IMFC) endorsed the guidelines for the dissemination standards nd they were split into two tiers: The General Data Dissemination System (GDDS) and the Special Data Dissemination Standard (SDDS). The International Monetary Fund executive board approved the SDDS and GDDS in 1996 and 1997 respectively, and subsequent amend-ments were published in a revised "Guide to the General Data Dissemination System." The system is aimed primarily at statisticians and aims to improve many aspects of stat-istical systems in a country. It is also part of the World Bank Millennium Development Goals and Poverty Reduction Strategic Papers. The IMF established a system & standard to guide members in the dissemination to the public of their economic and financial data. Currently there are two such systems: General Data Dissemination System (GDDS) and its superset Special Data Dissemination System (SDDS), for those member countries having or seeking access to international capital markets. The primary objective of the GDDS is to encourage IMF member countries to build a framework to improve data quality and increase statistical capacity building. This will involve the preparation of meta data describing current statistical collection practices and setting improvement plans. Upon building a framework, a country can evaluate statistical needs, set priorities in improving the timeliness, transparency, reliability and accessibility of financial and economic data. Some countries initially used the GDDS, but lately upgraded to SDDS. Some entities that are not themselves IMF members also contribute statistical data to the systems: Palestinian National Authority - GDDS Hong Kong - SDDS European Union institutions: the European Central Bank for the Eurozone - SDDS Eurostat for the whole EU - SDDS, thus providing data from Cyprus (not using any DDSystem on its own) and Malta (using only GDDS on its own) The application will be considered 1st by the IMF's executive board. After its consideration, the board will submit a report to the board of governors of the IMF with recommendations in the form of a "membership resolution." These recommendations cover the amount of quota in the IMF, the form of payment of the subscription, and other customary terms and conditions of membership.[19] After the board of governors has adopted the membership Resolution, the applicant state needs to take the legal steps required under its own law to enable it to sign the IMF's Articles of Agreement and to fulfill the obligations of IMF membership. Similarly, any member country can withdraw from the Fund, although that is rare. For example, in April 2007, the president of Ecuador, Rafael Correa, announced the expulsion of the World Bank representative in the country. A few days later, at the end of April, Venezuelan president Hugo Chavez announced that the country would withdraw from the IMF and the World Bank. Chavez dubbed both organizations as "the tools of the empire" that "serve the interests of the North."[20] As of June 2009, both countries remain as members of both organizations. The government of Venezuela was forced to back down because a withdrawal would have triggered default clauses in the country's sovereign bonds[citation needed]. A member's quota in the IMF determines the amount of its subscription, its voting weight, its access to IMF financing, and its allocation of Special Drawing Rights (SDRs). A member state cannot unilaterally increase its quota-increases must be approved by the Executive Board of IMF and are linked to formulas that include many variables such as the size of a country in the world economy. For example, in 2001, the People's Republic of China was prevented from increasing its quota as high as it wished, ensuring it remained at the level of the smallest G7 economy (Canada).[21] In September 2005 the IMF's member countries agreed to the first round of ad hoc quota increases for four countries, including China[citation needed]. On March 28, 2008, the IMF's executive board ended a period of extensive discussion and negotiation over a major package of reforms to enhance the institution's governance that would shift quota and voting shares from advanced to emerging markets and developing countries[citation needed]. Under existing arrangements, the industrialized countries(including Mexico) hold 57 per cent of the IMF votes[citation needed]. But the financial crisis has tilted control away from heavily indebted mature economies, such as the United States and the United Kingdom, in favor of the fast-growing, cash-rich, so-called BRIC economies of Brazil, Russia, India, and China.[4] Since the United States has by far the largest share of votes (approx. 17 percent) amongst IMF members (see table below), it has little to lose relative to European nations. At the 2009 G-20 Pittsburgh summit, the U.S. raised the possibility that some European countries would reduce their votes in favor of increasing the votes for emerging economies. However, both France and Britain were particularly reluctant as an increase in China's votes would mean China now has more votes than the UK and France. At a subsequent IMF meeting in Istanbul, the same month as the Pitts-burgh Summit, IMF managing director Dominique Strauss-Kahn then highlighted that "If we don't correct them, we will have the recipe for the next major crisis." [22] Citing the seriousness of the issue to be tackled. Members' quotas and voting power, and board of governors. Major decisions require an 85 percent supermajority.[23] The United States has always been the only country able to block a supermajority on its own. The following table shows the top 20 member states in terms of voting power (2,220,817 votes in total). The 27 member states of the European Union have a combined vote of 710,786 (32.07 percent).[24] On October 23, 2010, the ministers of finance of G-20, governing most of the IMF member quotas, agreed to reform IMF and shift about 6 percent of the voting shares to major developing nations and countries with emerging markets.[17] Members' quotas and voting power, and board of governors IMF member country". Quota: millions of SDRs" United States 37,149.3 17.09 Timothy F. Geithner Ben Bernanke 371,743-