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| International |
| Russia Lawmakers Nix Erasing Iraq’s Debt |
| 2003-04-11 |
| Edited for brevity. Russian lawmakers on Friday rejected a senior U.S. official's suggestion that Russia, France and Germany forgive debts to postwar Iraq to help the country restore its battered economy. U.S. Deputy Defense Secretary Paul Wolfowitz told the Senate Armed Services Committee Thursday that he hoped the countries would consider writing off some or all of their debts to Iraq's new government. "I hope ... they will think about the very large debts that come from money that was lent to the dictator to buy weapons and to build palaces and to building instruments of repression," Wolfowitz said. "I think they ought to consider whether it might not be appropriate to forgive some or all of that debt so the new Iraqi government isn't burdened with it." Gennady Seleznyov, speaker of Russia's lower house of parliament, criticized the U.S. call for debt forgiveness, saying it was up to Iraq, not the United States, to negotiate its obligations. "Iraq is not the 51st state of America," Seleznyov said in comments broadcast on Russia's Channel One. "All debt issues will be resolved only with the lawful government of Iraq." Communist leader Gennady Zyuganov accused the U.S. of taking revenge on countries that did not support its position on Iraq. "The Americans acted in a barbaric way, unleashing aggression on Iraq, and they are behaving in the same boorish way against countries that opposed U.S. actions," Zyuganov said in a statement. Methinks there's a subtle difference between "not support" and "block every US and UK resolution while supplying Iraq with weapons and other banned goodies." |
| Posted by:Dar |
| #17 mojo -- oops, guess I was a bit nyekulturnaya there. Don't you just love a language that has about 50 different ways to say, uh, "no" ;) |
| Posted by: Former Russian Major 2003-04-11 22:14:55 |
| #16 Looks like the original guy was just some loose cannon shooting off his mouth? |
| Posted by: someone 2003-04-11 18:27:26 |
| #15 newsflash from reuters "ST PETERSBURG, Russia (Reuters) - Russian President Vladimir Putin (news - web sites) said on Friday Moscow was ready to consider Washington's call for it to forgive Baghdad some $8-12 billion in debt. "On the whole the proposal is understandable and legitimate. In any event, Russia has no objection to such a proposal," Putin told a news conference alongside Germany's Gerhard Schroeder and France's Jacques Chirac. "I believe that we could begin to discuss the principles of this issue at the G8 summit in Evian. In any case, we are ready to do so," he said, referring to a June meeting of the Group of Eight leading industrial nations. U.S. Deputy Defense Secretary Paul Wolfowitz said on Thursday Russia, France and Germany could contribute to rebuilding Iraq (news - web sites) by writing off some or all of the loans they made to Iraq under President Saddam Hussein (news - web sites |
| Posted by: liberalhawk 2003-04-11 15:23:17 |
| #14 actually Joe, it was the discussion on your blog that gave me the idea of a direct offset. I assume that, unfortunately, acceptance of USSRs repudiation of Czarist debt was part of recognition agreements between USSR and western powers. thats why i suggested we gift Iraq with "such claim as we have" - theres a more legal term for that, i believe. |
| Posted by: liberalhawk 2003-04-11 15:18:01 |
| #13 It gets better. The international law doctrine of "odious debt," under which Saddam's debts would be repudiated, was crafted by A FRENCH LAWYER shortly after WW1. See this link. |
| Posted by: Joe 2003-04-11 15:00:42 |
| #12 "Yobanny v rot'!" Not in a family paper, I hope... ;) |
| Posted by: mojo 2003-04-11 14:28:40 |
| #11 how about we simply offset the Iraqi debt to Russia with Czarist debt previously uncollectible (might require revising some treaties, so what) the way you do this is transfer any legal claims to the Czarist debt to the new govt of Iraq. They then repudiate debt to Russia, declare that Czarist debt is now "paid". |
| Posted by: liberalhawk 2003-04-11 14:22:37 |
| #10 If it's up to Iraqi to 'negotiate its obligations', I have some simple suggestions for the Iraqi Interim Authority: 1) repudiate all debt on foreign arms purchased by Saddam. 2) repudiate all oil contracts with foreign countries signed by Saddam 3) notify all banks around the world that any funds put into those banks directly or indirectly by Saddam and his henchmen are the property of Iraq -- the Interim Authority then can file the necessary legal papers in each country's courts 4) state that those countries that contest #1-3 forfeit any opportunity to do business with Iraqi's oil industry in the future. That would starch some shorts in Europe. |
| Posted by: Steve White 2003-04-11 14:09:35 |
| #9 how about combining cancellation of Iraq debt with cancellation of other 3rd world debt, long part of the liberal agenda? |
| Posted by: liberalhawk 2003-04-11 13:12:49 |
| #8 The Russians watched their arms sales go down the toilet and worse yet they didn't get paid for the destroyed arms to begin with. I couldn't think of a better way to stop the military spending increases world wide. |
| Posted by: Yank 2003-04-11 12:58:57 |
| #7 This is beautiful. A Commie saying the new regime should honor the debts of the regime that was overthrown. They didn't do that after the Bolsheviks took over, so why should the Iraqis? I think the Iraqis' response will be something along the lines of "Yobanny v rot'!" |
| Posted by: Former Russian Major 2003-04-11 12:53:18 |
| #6 "The Americans acted in a barbaric way, unleashing aggression on Iraq, and they are behaving in the same boorish way against countries that opposed U.S. actions" Chechnya anyone? |
| Posted by: g wiz 2003-04-11 12:50:39 |
| #5 Nyeculturni Russkie Bastard, Mark I... |
| Posted by: mojo 2003-04-11 12:34:47 |
| #4 "The Americans acted in a barbaric way, unleashing aggression on Iraq, and they are behaving in the same boorish way against countries that opposed U.S. actions," Zyuganov said in a statement. Wow, the hypocrisy of this statement is breathtakingly audacious. I think we have found a candidate to replace Iraq's Disinformation Minister in sheer chutzpah. |
| Posted by: ColoradoConservative 2003-04-11 11:59:03 |
| #3 He hasn't seen the actual "revenge" yet... This is just a not so subtle nudge that there are reasons why you should think twice before dissing your allies. I would suggest that the Russians and any other nations with collection issues become familiar with the Keynsian economic concept known as "bad debt" |
| Posted by: Capsu78 2003-04-11 11:48:46 |
| #2 This position taken in conjunction with those of the head of the Russian state owned oil company Lukoil, make it clear that money is Russia's only International concern. I wonder how well those GPS jammers are selling now? |
| Posted by: D Hyatt 2003-04-11 11:45:39 |
| #1 Well, hell! Why should they forgive the debt - they've got to get paid for the weapons they sold Iraq somehow (as they are not likely to get much in the way of reconstruction dollars). (You did note the sarcasm, yes?) |
| Posted by: Tadderly 2003-04-11 11:41:01 |