[lbo-talk] Jubilee for Lebanon?

Robert Naiman naiman at justforeignpolicy.org
Mon Dec 25 17:24:30 PST 2006


Yoshie posted an interesting article from the Nation on the economic roots of the current political crisis in Lebanon. The article mentioned the large public debt.

I wonder how much of this debt is owed to Western banks, governments, and international financial institutions...

...and I wonder if folks in Hizbullah have talked about repudiating or forcibly renegotiating this debt.

In addition to the usual arguments, it would seem like they would have a good case that any debt to US and British banks would be odious debt on the grounds that the need for reconstruction was visited on them pretty directly by the US and Britain. Very directly in the case of the US. So instead of borrowing more and getting more in debt, repudiate the debt, use the freed resources for reconstruction, tell the US and British banks to get the money from their governments. And get new credit from the Muslim world.

Ecuador's doing it. Why not Lebanon?

Plus, talking down the debt would be a good way to undermine the present government -- and drive down the price of the debt on the secondary market, possibly lowering the price of buying it back in the future...



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