Leading global reinsurers establish an Independent

"Global Reinsurance Forum"

At this year's "Rendez-Vous de Septembre", the internationalconvention of insurers, reinsurers, brokers and reinsuranceconsultants in Monte-Carlo, a group of leading reinsurersannounced the establishment of the Global Reinsurance Forum (GRF),an independent forum. The founding members of the GRF are: Gen Re,Hannover Re, Lloyd's, Munich Re, Partner Re, RGA, SCOR, Swiss Re,Toa Re, Transatlantic Re and XL Capital.

The objective of the GRF is to promote a stable, innovative andcompetitive reinsurance market environment on a worldwide basis.More specifically, the forum seeks to:

- develop industry positions on regulatory, legal, tax andaccounting developments affecting the reinsurance industry;

- represent industry positions towards relevant regulatory andsupervising organizations, especially international organizations;

- promote a worldwide, open and fair framework for the developmentof reinsurance markets;

- advance the understanding of the value of reinsurance to theeconomy.

Denis Kessler, Chairman of the GRF comments: "The globalreinsurance industry is facing a changing internationalenvironment, especially with regard to regulatory matters. Inorder to address these challenges, the leading global reinsurershave come together to form the GRF, whose main objective is topromote a stable, innovative and competitive reinsurance marketenvironment on a worldwide basis. Today there is no such globalrepresentation for the reinsurance industry with the clear mandateto promote a regulatory framework that facilitates global risktransfer through reinsurance and other reinsurance-linked capitalsolutions. GRF will also work in conjunction with local orregional reinsurance associations on issues that have aninternational dimension."

This information is provided by HUGIN