September 2000 Call to Action News

Debt relief: Some good news, some bad

In a vote that took everyone by surprise, the House voted July 13 to raise funding for debt relief from $69 million to $225 million.

The force behind the scenes that achieved this partial victory was the coalition of the Congressional Black Caucus and the Hispanic Caucus. "They brought together those committed to the debt issue and those concerned about the spread of HIV/AIDS and decided they were not going to let Africa-related issues be overlooked again," said Dan Driscoll-Shaw, National Coordinator of Jubilee 2000/USA.

The victory is only partial because the vote has to be considered by a House-Senate conference committee, where the differences between the House's vote for $225 million and the Senate's vote for only $75 million will be ironed out. Even the $225 million is less than the $435 million the President had requested.

G8 squanders summit

Two weeks later, the G8 meeting of the wealthiest nations in Japan was labelled the "Squandered Summit" by debt relief campaigners. Not only did the G8 retreat from their promises at Cologne a year earlier. They have now announced only $15 billion of debt cancellation instead of $100 billion trumpeted at their last summit.

"Turn Up the Heat for Debt Cancellation!" says Jubilee 2000/USA. In the next few months of the Jubilee year, supporters are focusing their efforts on a concerted set of actions aimed at convincing U.S. policy makers that the debt owed by impoverished countries is a burning moral issue demanding an urgent political solution. Details at www.j2000usa.org