BBC News
The head of the World Trade Organisation, Mike Moore, has defended the global trading system, saying it should benefit the interests of all countries regardless of their wealth.
"We must make this system better and fairer for the poor as well as for the rich," he told the United Nations Conference on Trade and Development (Unctad) in Bangkok on Wednesday.
Mr Moore told delegates that that giving poorer countries better access to rich country markets was a "moral as well as economic imperative".
And he said it was not economic globalisation that threatened the developing world, but the absence of integration.
The Unctad meeting is the first gathering of economic ministers since the WTO's talks in Seattle last year broke up without agreement.
Mr Moore had hoped that by now he would already be into the early stages of a new round of trade liberalisation talks.
Instead, he is trying to pick up the pieces after the Seattle meeting ended amid sometimes violent protests on the streets and disarray in the conference chamber.
Different ideas
Mr Moore said negotiators had since shown a willingness to make progress, although analysts say that there is little prospect of an early resumption of talks.
He has been trying to mediate across a divide that was primarily between rich and poor countries.
The two groups had very different ideas about what they wanted on the negotiating agenda for the proposed round.
The United States and Europe wanted the WTO to establish a working group to look at the relationship between trade and basic work standards, such as child and forced labour.
The developing countries thought this was a covert attempt to erect new barriers to their goods.
They also wanted better access for their agricultural produce, textiles and clothing to the rich countries.
They also wanted the WTO to reconsider earlier agreements, including an accord on patents and copyright which they say makes it harder for them to produce cheap medicines.:
