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Mozambique should not pay the hidden debt

4 August 2017 - by Joseph Hanlon

English version of Portuguese article published in Savana, Maputo, 28 July 2017-07-30 by the Budget Monitoring Forum (Forum de Monitoria do Orçamento). The Mozambican government should not pay $1157 million in 2013-4 hidden loans to MAM and (...)
Argentina: The Elections And The Left

1 August 2017 - by Claudio Katz, Eduardo Lucita, Franck Gaudichaud

The Argentine legislative elections in August and October 2017 will be of huge importance for the entire Latin American region, with the government of Mauricio Macri establishing itself as a bastion of the neoliberal right after 12 years of (...)
Getting sucked into a quicksand of debt

16 July 2017 - by Meera Srinivasan

People in Batticaloa, one of the poorest districts in Sri Lanka, are badly hit by ‘predatory’ microfinance loans with exorbitant interest rates. “First, it was the tsunami that destroyed our community. Then came the war. Now, it’s microfinance.” (...)
Pablo Solón targeted: The Bolivian Government Must Stop Persecuting Those Defending Nature and Rights and Address the Real Problems

10 July 2017 - by Focus on the Global South

Pablo Solón, the Director of Fundación Solón, former Executive Director of Focus on the Global South, and former Bolivian Ambassador to the United Nations (UN), is being targeted by the Bolivian government for his vocal criticism of the government (...)
Micro-finance and Leasing: Today’s Loan Sharks

21 June 2017 - by Ahilan Kadirgamar

“In this context, it is not just the micro-finance lobby, but also the neo-liberal think tanks and economists that resist any moves to put a firm interest rate cap on such micro-finance schemes” It has taken the Central Bank many years to see (...)
The unbearable burden of being an Indian farmer : shot dead for demanding debt relief

19 June 2017 - by Sushovan Dhar

A nondescript district in the centre of this vast country has suddenly become a most sought after destination for politicians and media people. Lamentably, this transformation has come at the cost of human lives. Farmers in the Indian state of (...)
The dark side of infrastructure investment in Africa

12 June 2017 - by Collectif

With its Compact with Africa the German G20 presidency is actively promoting private loans and investment as solutions to infrastructure deficiencies on the African continent. The Compact aims at using public resources in order to improve the (...)
Egypt’s debt trap: The neoliberal roots of the problem

5 June 2017 - by Mohammed Mossallem

Table of Contents I. Introduction II. The Causes Behind the Debt Crisis in the 1980s III. Post Debt Crisis: The Golden Opportunity Squandered Debt Implications of The Policies Adopted IV. Falling back into the debt trap: 2000-2011 (...)
Beware of the dragon bearing gifts – Chinese loans and investments in the Philippines

1 June 2017 - by Randy David

Following President Duterte’s state visit to China in October 2016, 27 deals have been signed with Chinese state entities and business corporations covering around US$9 billion in loans and US$15 billion in investments. The President proudly (...)
Venezuela: Seven keys for understanding the current crisis

22 May 2017 - by Emiliano Terán Mantovani

It is not possible to understand the current crisis in Venezuela without analysing the factors that develop “from within” and are not entirely explained by the mainstream media. We offer here seven keys to the current crisis, emphasizing that (...)
Venezuela: Resolution of the Continental Assembly of the CADTM AYNA (Latin America and Caribbean)

9 May 2017 - by CADTM AYNA

Resolution of the Continental Assembly of the Committee for the Abolition of Illegitimate Debt - Abya Yala Nuestra América (CADTM AYNA / Latin America and Caribbean) on the situation in Venezuela During its 2017 Continental Assembly, held in (...)
ADB in Bangladesh: More Than Four Decades of Pillage & Devastation

8 May 2017 - by Hasan Mehdi

The ADB was established in 1966 at the initiative of UN’s Economic and Social Commission for Asia and Pacific (ESCAP). Two years after the great liberation war of 1971, it started working in Bangladesh. Since then (till 2016) Asian Development (...)
Debt as a Primeval Weapon of Dispossession

Breaking the Vicious Cycle of Illegitimate Private Debt in the global South

26 April 2017 - by Eric Toussaint

The “debt system” is gathering steam In Asia, Africa, Latin America and the Caribbean, just as in the highly industrialized countries, after going through several fundamental changes over the past 40 years. Mainly since the outbreak of the Third (...)
Will rating downgrades intensify or reverse Treasury’s neoliberal ideology?

18 April 2017 - by Patrick Bond

Supporters of austerity are happy because South Africa’s junk rating is a good stick with which to whip President Zuma. But his immediate concern is survival, not the economy. Could the current crisis generate a long-overdue era of (...)
Five Nobel Peace Laureates urge UN to pay off debt to Haiti

14 April 2017 - by Diálogo 2000 – Jubileo sur Argentina

On the eve of the Security Council’s decision to closedown the MINUSTAH, the highly criticized mission it has maintained in Haiti since 2004, five Nobel Peace Prize Laureates call on the UN to ensure reparations and an end to impunity for the (...)
Bangladesh: Harsh effects of the Grameen Bank and other microcredit institutions on the rural population

11 April 2017 - by Eric Toussaint, Sushovan Dhar, Nathan Legrand, Abul Kalam Azad

Abul Kalam Azad works with Action Aid in Dhaka, Bangladesh and is also a member of the CADTM. He researches the impacts of microcredit and has conducted Participatory Action Research with the victims of such loans. How does microcredit work in (...)
IMF lending freeze “pushing Tunisia to the brink”

11 April 2017 - by Bretton Woods Project

IMF freezes second tranche of $2.8 billion loan to Tunisia ITUC accuses Fund of risking democratic progress in Tunisia In February it emerged that the IMF had frozen payment on its $2.8 billion four-year Extended Fund Facility loan programme (...)
An Analysis of Argentina’s 2001 Default Resolution

6 April 2017 - by Martin Guzman

This report cites as an important positive step the Belgian Law on vulture funds passed on 12 July 2015. But it is currently being challenged by a Cayman Islands-based hedge fund, NML Capital Ltd. (a subsidiary of Elliott Management Corporation (...)
The BRICS New Development Bank meets in Delhi, to dash green-developmental hopes?

30 March 2017 - by Patrick Bond

Will the Brazil-Russia-India-China-South Africa (BRICS) bloc ever really challenge the world financial order? The BRICS New Development Bank (NDB) leadership is meeting in New Delhi from 31 March to 2 April with a degree of fanfare unmatched by (...)
Africa’s New Debts

23 March 2017 - by ajohnstone

Mozambique is the first major African nation in recent times to become unable to meet obligations to international creditors. In 2012, Mozambique’s obligations to its creditors amounted to 40 percent of Gross Domestic Product (GDP), they now (...)
Pakistan: CPEC - A “game-changer” or another “East India Company”?

21 March 2017 - by Abdul Khaliq

China-Pakistan Economic Corridor (CPEC) is a big business proposition with huge Chinese investments spreading over 15 years having a total outlay of up to $46 billion: $35 billion on the energy sector in the mode of IPPs (independent Power (...)
Global South debt payments increase almost 50% in two years

15 March 2017 - by Jubilee Debt Campaign

Government external debt payments reach highest level in the last decade following commodity price falls and rising value of the US dollar. Figures released before US Federal Reserve meeting where interest rates are expected to be increased (...)
How years of IMF prescriptions have hurt West African health systems

3 March 2017 - by Alexander E. Kentikelenis, Thomas Stubbs

The International Monetary Fund (IMF) provides financial assistance to countries in economic trouble. But its policy proposals don’t always yield positive results for the countries it purports to help. For instance, critics have argued that the (...)
No Pravin, it was not progressive or redistributive

28 February 2017 - by Shawn Hatting

The 2017 South Africa budget is not redistributive towards the working class nor is it progressive. Rather it is a standard neoliberal budget, delivered by a state that benefits the ruling class – white and black capitalists and top state (...)
Tribute to Wangui Mbatia

21 February 2017 - by Benoît

Wangui Mbatia was one of Kenya’s best known female activists from the late 1990s. See Kenyans MOURN Death of Wangui Mbatia, A Civil Rights Activist and [Rights hero Wangui Mbatia dies, praised for ideals, (...)