D8 summit ended in Cairo

The third summit meeting of a group of eight developing Muslim countries -- known as the D-8 -- has ended in the Egyptian capital, Cairo.

The leaders pledged to take up the challenge of economic globalisation and to negotiate as a bloc with the World Trade Organisation WTO.

The summit host, President Hosni Mubarak of Egypt, said the D-8 countries had discussed the effect of globalisation on their economies and pledged to double the volume of trade between them over the next five years.

The D-8 countries -- Egypt, Nigeria, Iran, Turkey, Pakistan, Bangladesh, Indonesia and Malaysia -- are home to about thirteen per cent of the world's population, but account for only four per cent of world trade.

From the newsroom of the BBC World Service