KUALA LUMPUR - Malaysia's ex-premier Mahathir Mohamad said Sunday that Muslim-majority countries should look east for development models and not at Western nations, which he described as "failures".
The outspoken former long-time leader, who is known as a fierce critic of the West, said countries like South Korea, Japan and China were "swimming in money", while Europe and the United States are mired in debt.
"Right now, there are so many problems with Western countries. The problem in the West is that they have borrowed too much and cannot repay. You cannot have that kind of a country as a model," Mahathir, 86, was quoted by the national news agency Bernama as saying.
"If you want to copy or learn something, learn from the successful people, not from the failures," he told an international conference on Islamic finance in northern Malaysia.
"So, we should continue to look to the East and not to the West. The West is going bankrupt," he said.
He attributed the debt crisis to greed.
"Greed will cause this. Today, we are seeing failed countries in the developed world," he added.
Mahathir ruled Malaysia for 22 years until 2003. During his tenure he introduced the "look east" policy to emulate work ethics and business techniques from Japan and South Korea.
