The director general of the U.N. Food and Agriculture Organisation (FAO) has proposed that a World Food Summit originally scheduled for next month should be postponed until June 2002, the Rome-based body said on Monday.
The planned delay was a response to fears for the safety of the numerous heads of states expected to attend the Rome meeting in the wake of the September 11 strikes against the United States and the subsequent U.S.-led attack on Afghanistan.
FAO Director General Jacques Diouf had initially battled to press ahead with the November 5-9 event in the face of growing concern from the Italian government, but finally decided to back a delay following high-level consultations.
"The director general has announced he is writing to the 49 members of the council to propose that in view of the current international situation the World Food Summit should be postponed until June 2002," said FAO spokesman Nick Parsons.
The council looked certain to back Diouf's call and a final confirmation was expected shortly.
The summit, called "World Food Summit -- five years later" , aimed to raise both the political will and the financial resources to achieve a goal set in 1996 to halve the number of hungry people - still more than 800 million -by 2015.
More than 100 heads of state and government had been invited to attend.
Italy's government made no secret of its worries about guaranteeing security at the high-profile event even before last month's plane attacks on New York and Washington.
Alarm bells started to ring in July when a summit of top world leaders in Genoa was overshadowed by two days of rioting by anti-globalisation demonstrators that left one protester dead and hundreds injured or arrested.
Shocked by the violence of the rioters, Prime Minister Silvio Berlusconi said the FAO summit should not be held amidst the ancient monuments of Rome and suggested that it be shifted to the Adriatic resort of Rimini.
The FAO agreed, albeit unwillingly.
After much behind-the-scenes activity, officials announced last week that the summit would, after all, be staged in Rome, only for Diouf finally to concede defeat and seek a delay.
Sources familiar with event said the confusion only served to worsen the plight of those whom the summit intended to help - the world's hungry.
Recent data indicated that the number of hungry people in the world was declining by only eight million a year and not by the 20 million needed to meet the U.N. target.