Senate Dodges Debt Relief

Bread for the World
Wednesday, 10 May 2000

Senate committee appropriates a fraction of the amount needed to provide debt relief to the world's poorest nations

Yesterday, the Senate Appropriations Committee voted to provide only $75 million of $435 million requested by President Clinton to fund debt relief efforts through 2001. In so doing, the Senate Appropriations Committee is ignoring the enormous public outcry for relieving the unjust burden of debt that cripples the economies of the world's poorest countries. The committee included $8 billion in new spending for FY2000 without providing any money for this year's debt relief efforts, even though five countries have already qualified for debt relief this year.

This vote seriously jeopardizes the international debt relief plan initiated at the G-7 Summit in Cologne, Germany last June.

It is wrong to ask African people to repay this debt when they are going without medicine. It is wrong to ask families to finance this debt as their own children are malnourished. It is wrong to ask Mozambique to pay off this debt after being devastated by floods.

The full Senate should rectify this act of moral cowardice by providing the full amount needed to fund the U.S. share of the debt relief plan. The House Appropriations Committee should also make the full appropriation when it takes up the foreign aid bill in June. The lives of thousands of children depend on it.

For more information, or to contact Bread for the World, see their website at: www.bread.org