LONDON — Nearly 140 campaign groups and charities urged the IMF and World Bank, G20 governments and private creditors on Tuesday to help the world's poorest countries through the coronavirus crisis by cancelling debt payments. The call, spearheaded by the British-based Jubilee Debt campaign, comes a day before a Group of 20 working group tasked with the coronavirus response for developing countries is due to meet. The campaign urged the immediate cancellation of 69 poor countries' debt payments for the rest of the year, including to private creditors, estimating that it would free up over $25 billion for the countries, or $50 billion if extended for 2021. It also called for debt cancellations or additional finance to be free of conditions on economic policy such as austerity, and for the G20 to back emergency rules that would prevent poorer countries from being sued by private creditors.

Source: International New York Times April 07, 2020 00:00 UTC