Finance ministers from 13 Asian countries will declare after their meeting Wednesday that progress has been made toward creating a mutual network of currency swaps, according to a draft of their joint statement.
The statement says they "are pleased to note the significant progress in bilateral negotiations on the bilateral swap arrangements" under a 13-nation accord reached a year ago.
Under the Chiang Mai Initiative, the 10-member Association of Southeast Asian Nations plus Japan, China and South Korea are committed to working toward bilateral pacts to create a regional currency swap network based on an existing $1 billion ASEAN swap mechanism.
The planned network is aimed at bolstering East Asian nations' defenses against the kind of speculative attacks that led to the Asian financial crisis in 1997 and 1998.