Jaitley says ISIS may hit global economy

Finance Minister Arun Jaitley on Tuesday warned that disruptive ISIS activities could impact the world economy.

"Meeting the challenges of development will now be increasingly diverted towards security measures and which part of the world is safe itself will become a great question," he said while speaking at the 93rd annual event of industry body Assocham.

He further said that what ISIS has been doing across the world in the last few months poses a new danger to civilisation and "therefore its impact on global economy cannot be understated."

The terrorist outfit Islamic State or ISIS has captured territories in Iraq and Syria and launched attacks in western world, including the recent attacks in Paris that killed 129 persons.

"And which part of the world will be safe itself will become a good question," he said.

He added ISIS activities will have consequential bearing on buoyancy in currency, trade, and tourism.

Jaitley said that earlier management of the economy was easier because there was one crisis in a decade or more, "but now, today, you live in a world, which is full of turmoil, full of volatility and you have to be think ahead of others because you are continuously busy dowsing the impact of one fire and trying to put firewalls around your own economy so that you can be saved of that crisis.

"I do believe the new global norm is volatility and turmoil. It is no longer stability and things can change very fast."

Moreover, he added, the patchy recovery and occasional green shoots witnessed in BRICS (Brazil, Russia, India, China, South Africa) nations were overtaken by certain geopolitical factors which has created global instability.

Jaitley further said that global resources which were earlier intended to be spent on poverty alleviation and meeting the challenges of development will now be increasingly diverted towards security measures and "which part of the world will be safe itself will become a good question."