COTE Ivoire President Henri Konan Bedie made an impassioned plea on Wednesday for the elimination of poor countries’ foreign debt, calling indebtedness the primary obstacle to development. Speaking in Paris at an international conference on globalization sponsored by the French Insititute of International Relations, Bedie also lamented the lack of investment in developing countries. Citing figures from the UN trade agency Unctad, he said two-thirds of international investment funds landed in the United States and the European Union, while developing countries together received less than a quarter and the entire African continent received scarcely 1,3%.