lasagnabro
10-01-2004, 11:26 PM
WASHINGTON, Oct 1 (Reuters) - An agreement among the Paris Club group of creditor nations on a write-off of a portion of Iraq's foreign debt is not imminent but could be achieved by the end of the year, the group's chairman said on Friday.
Washington has been pushing for a rapid debt deal, and an accord among top industrial nations before the November U.S. presidential election would be good news for President George W. Bush as he campaigns for a second White House term.
But major creditors in the 19-member Paris Club, an informal body that seeks sustainable solutions to the payment difficulties of debtor nations, are still struggling to reach an accord, said the Club's chairman, Jean-Pierre Jouyet.
"There's no real progress," Jouyet told reporters in Washington on the margins of a meeting of finance chiefs from the Group of Seven (G7) rich nations -- the United States, France, Japan, Germany, Britain, Italy and Canada.
http://www.reuters.com/financeNewsArticle.jhtml?type=bondsNews&storyID=6393412
Washington has been pushing for a rapid debt deal, and an accord among top industrial nations before the November U.S. presidential election would be good news for President George W. Bush as he campaigns for a second White House term.
But major creditors in the 19-member Paris Club, an informal body that seeks sustainable solutions to the payment difficulties of debtor nations, are still struggling to reach an accord, said the Club's chairman, Jean-Pierre Jouyet.
"There's no real progress," Jouyet told reporters in Washington on the margins of a meeting of finance chiefs from the Group of Seven (G7) rich nations -- the United States, France, Japan, Germany, Britain, Italy and Canada.
http://www.reuters.com/financeNewsArticle.jhtml?type=bondsNews&storyID=6393412