Nobel award gives impetus to poverty battle -Yunus

DHAKA, Oct 14 (Reuters) Nobel peace prize winner Muhammad Yunus of Bangladesh said today, his selection for the award gives fresh impetus against the war on poverty around the world and new responsibilities for him.

''It's very happy news for me and also for the nation. But it has burdened us with further responsibility,'' he told reporters at his home in the Bangladeshi capital, Dhaka.

''Now the war against poverty will be further intensified across the world. It will consolidate the struggle against poverty through microcredit in most of the countries.'' ''There should be no poverty, anywhere.'' Yunus and the Grameen Bank he founded won the 2006 Nobel Peace Prize on Friday for grassroots efforts to lift millions out of poverty that earned him the nickname ''banker to the poor''.

In a country born in 1971 after a war of independence and with much of its history strewn with coups and natural disasters, some hoped the Nobel Peace Prize -- the first in any category for a Bangladeshi -- would help usher in a less troubled future.

Yunus told a packed news conference in Dhaka his mission would be to make Bangladesh poverty-free.

''Currently we have set a target to halve the poverty level in Bangladesh by 2015, and then to eradicate poverty fully by another 15 years,'' he said.

''I believe this is possible, given our sincere and combined efforts,'' he added.

Yunus said he planned to use the Nobel award money to set up eye hospitals for the poor.

Yunus, 66, set up a new kind of bank in 1976 to lend to the very poorest in his native Bangladesh, particularly women, enabling them to start up small businesses without collateral.

In doing so, he pioneered microcredit, a system copied in more than 100 nations from the United States to Uganda.

Grameen Bank beneficiaries celebrated Yunus' award by singing and dancing to the beat of drums.

''He has showed us a way to live and to get out of poverty. We are so much proud of him,'' said Ranu Begum, who first borrowed a small sum of money from the bank ten years ago.

''We pray for his long life and for him to become more famous -- and a leader of all the poor people across the world,'' she said.

The bank, which has turned a profit in all but three years, lends to 6.6 million people, 96 per cent of them women, and has not received donor funds in eight years. It counts beggars among its members, giving them interest-free loans and life insurance.

''A wonderful celebration is going on over the success of Bangladesh at the recognition of the country's efforts to eradicate poverty,'' Yunus said, after laying wreaths at a memorial in Dhaka.

''This is a symbol of our history of struggle, which encouraged us to go ahead fighting all odds,'' said Yunus, thronged by hundreds of his joyful admirers.

REUTERS BDP BS1559