TORONTO - Jailed former media baron Conrad Black gives his thoughts on solving the international financial crisis in a column published in the National Post on Saturday.
Black cautioned against "instant bargain hunting'' and called for serious reform to the U.S. and Chinese economies.
"This international financial crisis will subside when the United States has at least believably started to reduce its dependence on foreign oil and its trade imbalance with China; Chinese currency has been revalued, and China has implemented some degree of structural reform; and enough economic water has been trod to ensure that private sector financial institutions are relatively stable,'' wrote Black.
Black is in a central Florida prison, where he's serving a six-and-a-half-year sentence for fraud and obstruction of justice.
His column was published as The International Monetary Fund and the World Bank held weekend discussions in Washington following Friday's G7 talks in which world financial leaders pledged tighter control of banks and other financial institutions in the wake of turmoil on global financial markets that was sparked by the U.S. subprime mortgage crisis.
This is not the first column the Post has published since Black was incarcerated in Coleman prison on March 3. On March 28, Black wrote a column on the U.S. presidential race.
Before entering prison, Black, who was head of the world's third-largest media empire until he was ousted in 2003 following shareholder complaints, had said he planned to teach, write and pray while continuing to fight his convictions.
The Montreal-born press baron was convicted of fraud and obstruction of justice last year over payments he took while he was the head of Hollinger International.
Black's appeal is expected to go before the court in June.
