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Debt/87 billion US$ for Bush-war by Africafocus (reposted by raf) Wednesday November 05, 2003 at 09:50 AM

africafocus@igc.org

As the U.S. Congress approves $87 billion for the U.S. occupation of Iraq, long-standing promises by rich creditors to provide debt "relief" of some $49 billion for 42 countries remain unfulfilled, and largely off the radar screen for policymakers. Yet debt remains a crippling burden not only for the 34 African countries that qualify as Heavily Indebted Poor Countries (HIPC), but also for major African powers such as Nigeria and South Africa.

Jubilee Research, one of the successor organizations to the Jubilee
2000 campaign for debt cancellation, released a report in September
detailing the failure of the HIPC initiative, under the leadership
of the World Bank and the IMF, to fulfill even the limited
commitments made to date. This issue contains excerpts from that
report.

An earlier summary critique of the HIPC initiative.