Africa: Multilateral Debt Cancellation
AfricaFocus Bulletin
Jan 18, 2005 (050118)
(Reposted from sources cited below)
Editor's Note
"Given the urgency and need for immediate action, we urge the G8 to
begin immediately and in particular for G7 finance ministers to
reach agreement on 100 percent multilateral debt relief at their
February 4th meeting," African finance ministers said in Cape Town
after concluding a meeting with British finance minister Gordon
Brown. But despite Brown's high-profile African visit, accompanied
by pledges of debt cancellation and increased aid, debt campaigners
still have questions about the details of Britain's plan and the
will of other rich countries to act.
A new briefing for the Debt and Development Coalition Ireland,
excerpted below, noted that "various proposals for multilateral
debt cancellation have now been put on the table by G7 countries -
the UK and US. ... Whilst this is very encouraging, in some ways
these proposals are an extension of the discredited HIPC initiative
and suffer from some of the same limitations such as limited
country lists and the lack of a fair and transparent procedure to
deal with all unpayable debt."
Another AfricaFocus Bulletin sent out today contains statements on
debt from the African Social Forum in December and from a
submission by the UK Jubilee Debt Campaign to Prime Minister Tony
Blair's Commission for Africa. For related news on debt, see
]http://allafrica.com/debt');]http://allafrica.com/debt[/url]. For previous AfricaFocus Bulletins on the topic, see
]http://www.africafocus.org/debtexp.php');]http://www.africafocus.org/debtexp.php[/url].
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Multilateral Debt Cancellation: a Briefing by Sony Kapoor
Jubilee Research at the New Economics Foundation For Debt and
Development Coalition Ireland
December 2004
[Excerpts. Full text, including graphs, available at
]http://www.debtireland.org/resources/');]http://www.debtireland.org/resources/[/url]
papers-briefing-Multilateral-Debt-Cancellation.htm (type URL on one
line)]