Launch of Jubilee + Website. Jubilee +, one of the official successor organisations to Jubilee 2000, will launch its new website on Friday 20 April.
Argentina close to default on her external debt Argentina woke up this week to an uncertain future, which began with the sudden resignation of the newly appointed finance minister, Lopez Murphy, today, Tuesday, 20th March. (21 March 2001)
Soyinka Blasts World Bank, IMF. Nairobi, Kenya: The World Bank and the International Monetary Fund (IMF) have received a bashing from an unfamiliar quarter, Nigerian literature Nobel Prize laureate Wole Soyinka, the East African Standard reported. (08 March 2001)
Malawi denied what G7 promised. Japan has cancelled Malawi's debt and the Paris Club, in a significant change to its rules, has moved the "cut-off" date, which limits the debt eligible for "relief". But Malawi's debt is still unsustainable because the World Bank has ignored what the G7 promised in Cologne in 1999. (15 February 2001)
Cameroon gains little from HIPC
Despite being granted HIPC debt 'relief', Cameroon faces a new debt crisis because debt service is larger than aid and the country must borrow just to repay its debt. Even AIDS control requires new loans. (05 February 2001)
Debt relief due to protest
There would have been no debt cancellation without our protests, admits a former World Bank official. (05 February 2001)
Kenya: IMF
withholds loan and China agrees to cancel debts.
The IMF has been forced to postpone the release to Kenya
of the second tranche of its so-called Poverty Reduction
and Growth Facility (PRGF) loan - reports Kenya’s
daily newspaper, "The Nation". (22 January
2001)
US Helms makes foreign
aid proposal.Senator Jesse Helms, the
well known skeptic of US overseas aid is for the first
time advocating raising the US foreign aid budget. (17
January 2001)
Italy signs a law to
reduce HIPCs debt.The minister of
Treasure Vincenzo Visco has signed a law to reduce the
external debt of the highly indebted poor countries. (12
January 2001)
IMF the main
beneficiary of Zambia’s HIPC debt deal.
An analysis carried out by the newly-launched
"JubileePlus" – reveals that in 2001
– 2005 Zambia will be paying substantially more to
the IMF and World Bank than other creditors under the
"enhanced" HIPC debt deal. (10 January 2001)
Candle lit for debt relief's unfinished
business. As Jubilee 2000 prepares to mark its
final demonstration, Larry Elliott of the Guardian
praises the campaign as 'the most successful mass
movement of the past 25 years' but says there is still
plenty of unfinished business which means the campaign
must continue.
Argentinian
workers bring country to a halt,in
protest at Government's austerity measures adopted to
prevent default on its $20 billion debt service bill next
year (16 November 2000)
Peaceful
Demonstration against debt strikes different note.Debt campaigners made a major impression on
Prague as they marched through the city in a mass funeral
procession to mark the 19,000 lives that are lost every
day to the debt crisis.
Report
by UK NGOdemonstrates that
debt and linked conditions enforced by the IMF do not
only bring European protestors onto the streets, but have
led to at least 50 separate cases of civil unrest in 13
poor countries in the last 10 months.
Behind closed
doors, creditors deny Uganda $15 million of
debt relief and violate the G7 Cologne Agreement (20
September 2000)
Oxfam
calls for urgent review of debt initiative, as
new analysis reveals that Some of the world's poorest
countries will still be spending far more on debt than
they are able to invest in priority social investments
like health and education (19 September 2000)
Biking to a better
world. Los Angeles Times reports on the
vicars passing through Pasadena on way to Japan to urge
Third World debt relief (14 July 2000)
Debt campaigners chain
themselves to UK Treasury doorsand tell
Gordon Brown to "stop taking the money."
Demonstrations around the world target G8 Finance
Ministers and Japanese government in advance of Fukuoka
meeting. (7 July 2000)
G8 leaders must
talk to African presidents about debt, said
South African Foreign Minister Nkosazana Zuma. Meanwhile,
UN Secretary General Kofi Annan has called debt a threat
to the survival of some African economies. (31 March
1999)
TV Telethon holds
debate on debt in Haiti.8,000 campaigners
add their voice by chanting "Yes to life! No to
debt!" outside TV studios in Port-au-Prince. (10
February 2000)
Debt still firmly on
the political agenda, as European leaders
respond to Britain's 100 per cent announcement and
African leaders call for further action. (26 January
2000)
Obuchi-san, chokeshi!Debt campaigners chant in the New Year by calling on
Japan, the new chair of the G8 to cancel 100% of the debt
owed by the poorest countries. (12 January 2000)
Where inequality engulfs Jesus and
Ericsson.Madeleine Bunting from the
Guardian meets two children whose future is tied to
Peru's debt, but whose families are joining the campaign
against it. (11 January 2000)
New Christian Aid report "The millennium
lottery" highlights the scandal of the
millions of children in Africa who die each year because
resources are diverted healthcare to servicing debts. (20
December 1999)
'We're here! We're wet!
Cancel the Debt!'30,000 supporters from
sunday school teachers to steelworkers join hands in rain
in a peaceful demonstration to demand debt cancellation
at the WTO meeting in Seattle (2 December 1999)
International
Conference on AIDS in Zambialeads to
passionate calls for debt cancellation and for radical
change to the conditions tied to debt relief. (20October
1999)
New Christian Aid report questions legitimacy of rich
countries demanding debt repayment whilst they owe
vast 'eco-debt' to the international community as a
result of environmental damage (8 October 1999)
Mozambique's parliament
has challenged the IMFby rejecting one of
the conditions of HIPC debt relief, and instead has
decided to protect the cashew nut processing industry.
(22 Sept 1999)
Zimbabwean
organisations warn of economic recessionunless
urgent solutions are found to cancel its debt. They
called for increased control over new loans and policies
that protect the poor (12 August 1999)
Brazil plans
people's referendum on debt, following the
successful people's tribunal. Jubilee 2000 will also
campaign for the release of secret debt documents. (14
July 1999)
