Kelley Carter
6:29 p.m.
29 November 2009
Recently two vulture funds have sued the country of Liberia for a debt dating back to 1978. The sum of the debt is equal to 5% of Liberia’s budget for this year. The Liberian finance minister has been quoted saying the country could not afford to repay the debt. Liberia has accused the Carribean registered vulture fund of trying to profit from poverty. Details are still unclear but it appears Liberia borrowed 6.5 million from a bank in 1978 and the debt was then sold many times, increasing in value. London High Court, which was appointed to handle the civil case against Liberia decided that Liberia should be liable for 20 million without a hearing. A court in New York in 2002 ruled that Liberia owed 18 million dollars. UK activists are trying to get the law that allows UK courts to hear cases from vulture funds against the poorest countries in the world.
I’m not sure whether its legal for a Carribean based fund to sue Liberia in a UK court. But it seems that since Liberia has in a civil war for 14 years before it ended in 2003 they can’t be expected to be able to repay such a large debt. 5% of a government’s yearly budget is a lot for such a fragile government. I think it is suspicious that one of the funds suing Liberia recently won 11 million in a similar lawsuit against Nicaragua and I think it likely that the funds are profiting off of poor countries that are too weak to defend themselves in UK courts.
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/africa/8380117.stm
1 comment:
I'm a little confused as to how a UK court could hear such a case either, and I think it is very sad that such a poor country is being pressed to repay such a large debt when the wealthiest nations in the world have gotten away with even larger debts for much longer. It certainly doesn't seem fair.
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