عين الرئيس بوش , السيد جميس بيكر كممثل عنه في متابعه ملف الديون العراقيه
تصفح المقال نيويورك تايمز

ويقدر كاتب المقال تلك الديون بحوالي مائه بليون دولار لنادي باريس ومائه اخرى عن التعويضات للكويت والمتضريرين الاخرين.
ارغب في مناقشه مسأله الديون. يرجى المساهمه
Baker Is Named to Restructure Iraq's Huge Debt, please have a look to NT
The writer estimated the dept to be about 100 B$ for Paris club and anothe 100B$ for war reperations to Kuwait and others.
I would like to discuss the Iraqi dept issue, please contribute!

I hope Baker has a chance to talk with the folks at Jubilee Iraq
as they have also been working on the issue of Iraq's debt

I am a great admirer of James Baker. He is one of only a handful of men with the kind of stature and respect around the world to negotiate Iraq's debt forgiveness and restructuring. All these countries Iraq is now indebted to, loaned money to your tyrant for him to put in his pocket at the expense of the Iraqi people. Surely many can be shamed into forgiving this burden, and Baker is just the man to it. He is from my state, and so I have followed his career. He is a truly fine man of uncommon quality and character with exceptional negotiating skills. Bush could not have done better for Iraq.

My only problems with Baker are his overly close friendship with the Saudis and some supposed latent anti-semitism. Fortunately, that shouldn't prevent him from helping Iraq solve its debt problems. Many of them are odious debts anyway, so that should help in the long run.

I just wanted to know about the following , please help me evaluate the situation.
From legal prospective, what is the complication of having the Iraqi government don't comply with what Saddam's government had signed and agree for .. I am not talking only about the financial issues, which is of concern under this topic, but also other , let explain.

Saddam use to have so may arrangments and aggrements that he used to brib people and other governemnts in order to support his regime. Something like the annual one b$ gift of oil to Jordan, The bribs to all Arab buisnessmen as Oil contracts. Arrangements to explore and investe in Iraqi OIl with Russia and France..

My point is that is there any internation legal way by the new government of not following what Saddam had signed? What was the case with pre Hitler government in Germany?

Quoting Lee



This is a very valuable piece of info.. Thanks Lee

i like what Lee suggests regarding the iraqi debts but i don't know if this could work within a practical political frame and i agree with salim in that it's kind of unfair that iraqis should suffer all these debts which they have nothing to do with it and it's all because of saddam's stupid policies. but other than this i'm wondering if the new iraqi goverment after being establish can reduce these debts by far by resuming the huge projects which were rejected or put on hold during saddam's period like "if i'm not being mistaken" the contract of majnoon oil field with japan and the replacing of elecricity rods with undergroud cables, also with japan for a considerable amount of money goes to iraq.
i'm sure there is a lot more projects that could be done to cover these debts and the sooner the better.
i apologize if my information is not right, i'm not well aware of politics.

ترجمه مقطع "لي" الذي اورده سالم

First off, there should be an immediate moratorium on debt repayment -- Iraqi international accounts are being used, today, to repay Saddam's debt.

I think there should be a referendum of the Iraqi people on the debt -- I'm sure they would repudiate it.

It would also be good to start legal proceedings against all organizations who lent money to Saddam after the 91 Kuwait invasions, noting them as accessories in his post 91 crimes. THAT would cause some rich country squealing!

Maybe after his Iran war in the 80s? (To include the USA, his anti-Iran ally?) If the US responsibility for Saddam was set to be about, say, $87 billion, which Iraq agreed the US paid -- this would be a huge precedent. Other countries (France???) would be extremely uncomfortable; good.

It would put financial teeth in Bush's policy of no longer supporting dictators, and would reduce such support. It's also a just cause that, potentially, many anti-Bush folk could get behind.

In fact, US, EU, World Bank support for dictators has long been disgusting. Loans or grants to humans, for houses, for instance, would be MUCH better. Let Iraq be the country that leads in an anti-dictator international financial revolution!

A world without dictators, in my lifetime. (my dream)

Saddam's debts are not Iraq's debts, and Iraq shouldn't pay a single penny of them.

If financiers around the world realized they might lose their money, when they loaned money to a dictator, those dictators would lose power that much more quickly.

If I were Iraqi, I would fight hard to cancel the debt. After all, if France can, so can you!

some info i found on the paris club..........

Anyway, the defining characteristic of Paris Club workouts is that they are slooooow. There are a number of reasons for this; the chief one is obviously that there is no urgency on the part of the creditors because it isn’t their crisis, but there are also institutional constraints. To understand the institutional constraints, it’s worth taking a look at the Paris Club principles

There’s five of them:

1) Debts are dealt with on a case-by-case basis, dependent on the individual circumstances of each debtor
2) The Paris Club works by consensus; no decision is taken unless there is unanimous agreement
3) Debts are only rescheduled given sufficient conditionality on domestic policy to ensure that the restructuring actually improves the prospects of the debtor. This usually means an IMF program.
4) Sounds obvious but isn’t; there is a principle of solidarity which ensures that members agree to actually implement the decisions of their Club representatives.
5) The Paris club has a comparable treatment principle; it only works on the basis that the debtor will not give any creditors a better deal than it agreed with the Paris Club. This is in order to ensure that the money put in by government creditors doesn’t just go straight out the door to some other class of creditor.

There are lots of other rules and conventions but these are the important ones. Of these, number 1 is a good thing; there are no hard and fast rules to get things stuck on a technicality, and it is considered bad form to make decisions based on possible precedent-setting. Number 4 is a good thing because its practical impact is that the people round the table in Paris actually have the power to get things done; there’s no dicky ratification process back home (democracy shmemocracy). Number 3 is a real pain in the arse because a) it ties countries into IMF programs which are often really badly designed for their purpose and b) it gives the IMF more negotiating leverage, because the IMF can hold out the prospect of scuppering the Paris Club talks in order to get a bit more cooperation.

Numbers 2 and 5 are the main reason that things take forever. The permanent members of the Paris Club are Austria, Australia, Belgium, Canada, Denmark, Finaland, France, Germany, Ireland, Italy, Japan, the Netherlands, Norway, Russia[1], Spain, Sweden, Switzerland, the Brits and the USA. Try getting unanimous agreement out of that little lot in a hurry. Furthermore, the debtor for its own part has a dicey game in negotiating because it knows that principle 5 means that the Paris Club agreement sets the tone for the whole debt workout; if you get the Paris Club terms wrong in either direction, it means that you’re going to end up with an unworkable debt reduction proposal and go back to square one.

Principle 5 also makes the specific case of Iraq more complicated because it’s not just a matter of James Baker going round the world saying come on you stingy bastards and Chirac saying oh go on then. Now that the debt’s entered the Paris Club process, it’s no longer really an option for France or Germany to unilaterally forgive a chunk of debt (that’s presumably why they did it). The Paris Club is a good process for making sure that the eventual restructuring is a genuinely workable plan, and for minimising free-riding by creditors, but it’s more or less completely incompatible with the piecemeal, quick-win style approach which Baker appears to be taking.

Le Club De Paris

Why all the Rif Raf about this? Its very simple:

Imagine a hostage taker who takes 10 people hostage. He then proceeds to take their money from their wallets, and threatens that if they dont, they die. Then he uses this money, to buy himself a big bomb, and blows up an adjacent building with this bomb. The lucky survivors of this explosion label the hostage taker a war criminal, and depand reparations for all the damages he has done.

The next day a sniper takes the hostage taker out, and free the hostages.

Who pays for the reparations?

..... the Hostage taker!! Yes, he did use the hostages money, but this was without their consent. They have nothing to do with it.

--------------------------

In our case, Saddam had the Iraqi people under his foot, he robbed them, and used that money to fund his military adventure into Kuwait. Now saddam is under arrest. HE is the one who is supposed to pay up. Not one fils should come from the Iraqi people. They didnt sanction Mr Saddam to power, so he did not do anything in their names.

To answer your questions: Who should pay reparations: Saddam, and his active Ba-ath cronnies. Simple.

There was no debt relief for Russia and the Eastern Bloc nations, after the fall of the communist tyranny! Why is Iraq any different? Most nations in Latin American and Africa were al under brutal dictatorships the United States funded and supported and the US still expects them to pay those debts even after their dictators were over turned. Why does Iraq have any more a special request than, say South Africa? Chile? Argentina?

Let me see if I understand correctly. Other countries' debts were treated unfairly, so Iraq's must be, too? Two (or more) wrongs make a right?

The just thing would have been for those former Soviet bloc countries to have their debt forgiven. They suffered injustice, so Iraq must too?

And the debts of these nations?

Abacha, General Sani ----------------------------Nigeria
Amin, Idi ------------------------------------------Uganda
Banzer, Colonel Hugo ---------------------------Bolivia
Batista, Fulgencio --------------------------------Cuba
Bolkiah, Sir Hassanal ----------------------------Brunei
Botha, P.W. ---------------------------------------South Africa
Branco, General Humberto ---------------------Brazil
Cedras, Raoul -------------------------------------Haiti
Cerezo, Vinicio -----------------------------------Guatemala
Chiang Kai-Shek ---------------------------------Taiwan
Cordova, Roberto Suazo ------------------------Honduras
Christiani, Alfredo -------------------------------El Salvador
Diem, Ngo Dihn ---------------------------------Vietnam
Doe, General Samuel ----------------------------Liberia
Duvalier, Francois --------------------------------Haiti
Duvalier, Jean Claude-----------------------------Haiti
Fahd bin'Abdul-'Aziz, King ---------------------Saudi Arabia
Franco, General Francisco -----------------------Spain
Hassan II-------------------------------------------Morocco
Marcos, Ferdinand -------------------------------Philippines
Martinez, General Maximiliano Hernandez ---El Salvador
Mobutu Sese Seko -------------------------------Zaire
Noriega, General Manuel ------------------------Panama
Ozal, Turgut --------------------------------------Turkey
Pahlevi, Shah Mohammed Reza ---------------Iran
Papadopoulos, George --------------------------Greece
Park Chung Hee ---------------------------------South Korea
Pinochet, General Augusto ---------------------Chile
Pol Pot---------------------------------------------Cambodia
Rabuka, General Sitiveni ------------------------Fiji
Montt, General Efrain Rios ---------------------Guatemala
Salassie, Halie ------------------------------------Ethiopia
Salazar, Antonio de Oliveira --------------------Portugal
Somoza, Anastasio Jr. --------------------------Nicaragua
Somoza, Anastasio, Sr. -------------------------Nicaragua
Smith, Ian ----------------------------------------Rhodesia
Stroessner, Alfredo -----------------------------Paraguay
Suharto, General ---------------------------------Indonesia
Trujillo, Rafael Leonidas -----------------------Dominican Republic
Videla, General Jorge Rafael ------------------Argentina
Zia Ul-Haq, Mohammed ----------------------Pakistan

More;
http://www.thirdworldtraveler.com/US_Third.../dictators.html

This post is a prime example of the thinking of the "true believers" in socialism that still exist in america today. The link is full of half truths conjucture as fact and a narrow view of complex issues.

هذا البريد مثال جيّد لعقليّة المؤمنين الخالصين للاشتراكيّة التي مازالت تتواجد في أمريكا . رابطته ممتلئة بحقائق النّصف و الرّؤية الضّيّقة
للموضوعات المعقّدة

Spoken like a true fascist, SIR!!!

George, and what if you are right?

Just WHAT exactly is your point - that the world suffers from dictators and its consequences, and so, since no justice is distributed to them, that Iraq must be made to suffer too?

19 hostages get shot by a gunman and one escapes this injustice, but you would rather see that one hostage dead?

You're a socialist idiot.

To advocate debt relief FOR ALL OPPRESSED people, and not the latest fad and fancy of the Cult of Bush.

You guys forget, debt relief IS a Socialist concept. The debt relief is not for the Iraqis, it is for the new corporations planning on plundering Iraq.

George,


That is exactly what most of those Socialists can't understand..
In Arabic we say " Not for being in love with Omar but because of my hate to Ali" Means that My hate to Bush club would push me to kill Iraqis.. That what we saw with all those demostrations that were derived by the hate to the American policy rather than looking to Iraqis as human beings that deserve to live.
What is wrong if the interest of the new corporations coincide with the interst of Iraqis, Why do you only look to the empty half ?

Salim is right.

I really don't care whether the idea is socialist in origin, started in some Athenian debating society, or if the Muppets came up with it. A good idea is a good idea. And it's downright embarassing to me as an American how many of my countrymen are like George B. here, railing against everything that George Bush says or does, without regard to its individual merit, simply because George Bush says or does it. It's also embarassing to me, as a Democrat, to see my party behaving like children screaming that the President has given any idea he touches 'cooties.'

I would run this through the translator program, but I'm on vacation and away from it for the next couple of weeks. Not to mention I'm not sure it can cope with 'cooties.'

Achillea & Salim Thanks for taking over I was away from the computer for a couple of days.

George so pointing out the slant of your link is fascism?

I only read the details of a couple of your "dictators" listed on the site. They were ones that I had studied at length as well as had personal experience with in my life. I have very little patience for self hatered and your link was full of it. There is no other country in the history of the world that has done as much good for people in other parts of the world as America. We are not perfect and I know that our national interest at times is in conflict with what's right for others but my statement is still valid.

قرأت تفاصيل دكتاتورك المحصورين على الموقع فقط . كانوا تلك اللّواتي التي قد درستهنّ في الطّول وأيضًا كان لدى تجربة شخصيّة في حياتي . لديّ صبر صغير جدًّا لهاتيريد النّفس و رابطتك كانت ممتلئة به . ليس هناك بلد آخر في تاريخ العالم الذي قد عمل مثل الجيّد للنّاس في الأجزاء الأخرى من العالم كأمريكا . نحن غير ممتازون و أعرف أن مصلحتنا القوميّة أحيانًا في تناقض مع ما الصّحيح للآخرين لكنّ تصريحي صحيح حتّى الآن .

I have worked with, (a family of ministers within the Assemblies of God churches) many churches, and have found that very corrupt pastors and elders have always justified their sins by blaming others and defending some of the most guilty out of a cult of personality. This seems to be happening with Iraq. The Bush administration is allowing American businesses to strip the autonomous ability of local businessmen to make money. Instead of calling the administration on this “sin” you have baptized the sin for fear of appearing disloyal in the Cult of Bush.

You should put the Iraqis before Bush’s image. You are so committed to an image of America, you will be blind to those who would use that image to manipulate you.

Actually, I voted for Gore.

I don't think George Bush is perfect, nobody is. I certainly don't worship him, that is reserved for my Goddess. But I find the above post informative -- as to George B.'s thought processes. Apparently, to praise some good George Bush has done, or even to defend him against partisan calumny, makes one a mindless 'Bushayeen.' This sort of arrogant, insulting mindset has become the hallmark of the liberal left these days. Dare to point out they're wrong and you're just a brainwashed fool, poor soul.

George,


To whom would this good point go ?
I would like you go through your last posts..Check if you aren't doing what you ask not to..?

I haven't seen anybody on this board saying that debt relief for everybody is a good thing what we are talking about is the case of Iraq and whether or not the Iraqi people should be responsible for the Debt Incurred under Saddam.

لم أر أي شخص على هذه اللّوحة أقول أن تخفيف الدّين للجميع شيء جيّد ما نتكلّم عنه هو قضيّة العراق و سواء أو ليس يجب أن يكون الشّعب العراقيّ مسئول عن الدّين المتحمّل تحت صدام

They are responsible only as far as they did not find a way to get rid of him but the fact that he left tens of thousands dead in his wake shows that they did try. An even greater share of the blame for his debt falls on the UN for making deals for oil while Iraq was under sanctions.

هم مسئولون فقط حتّى لم يجدوا طريقةً للتّخلّص منه لكنّ حقيقة أنه ترك عشرات الآلاف ميّتًا في سهره يظهر أنهم قد حاولوا . نصيب أكبر حتّى للوم لانخفاضات دينه على الأمم المتّحدة لعقد الاتّفاقيّات للزّيت بينما كان العراق تحت العقوبة .



As for who is skimming money and taking advantage of the sitiuation in Iraq to further the business interests of American Companies it is an unfortunate side affect of war. It has happend in every war held for at least the last 500 years. This does not make it right but it also does not make the war an unjust or evil thing.

بالنّسبة إلى الّذي يمرّر بسرعة المال و يجني فائدة من السيتييوشن في العراق إلى أكثر مصالح أعمالهم هو جانب بائس يؤثّر للحرب . لديه هابيند في كلّ حرب ممسوكة لعلى الأقلّ آخر 500 سنة . هذا لا يجعله صحيح لكنه أيضًا لا يجعل الحرب شيئًا شرّيرًا أو ظالمًا .

I think the debt should be repudiated immediately.

It would certainly send a clear message to the world: do business with a tyrant and you could be throwing money into a whole.

Dear All:
I have a detailed study I did of this, but it is the property of the Institute fro economic development. It is also way too long and detailed to mention here. Here is the jist of the debt issue.
1) No one knows how much we owe.
All these are estimates based on arbitrary interest rates and principle amounts.
2) The war reparations are a different animal than sovereign debt.
Debts can be dealt with through cancellation, and rescheduling. There are two types of debts. Debts accumulated before 1990 and debts accumulated after 1990. All debts accumulated after 1990 can be litigated as given illegally to a dictator. The rest is left to fine American and Iraqi diplomacy.
War reparations we have to pay by international law. Unless the people we owe it to forfeit. The Bulk of this debt is owed to Kuwait and Saudi Arabia. The amount is around 50 million. The other fifty million may be frivolous claims. Nevertheless, the U.N has paid around 100 Billion dollars in reparation during the past 14 years. They also have been “improperly handling” Iraqi oil for food program money. after prosecuting those responsible, the balance should be paid by U.N. It is ironic how esily then they may issue a law concelling the original dictating payment.

The situtation has changed since I did the report. Things changed to the better. If you know the developments please help me update this.

Lastly.
Iraqi money taht was stolen by sadam was used also to buy the the hired hand taht killed Iraqis on his behalf and do his bidding. These people's money should be confiscated and used to repay the debt. We should also charge them interest and or a fine. They shoudl be happy we don't hang them for high treason.
I imagine that some people with sufficient involvement in the former regime should be taxed to compensate and payoff some of the Iraqi debt because it is their complicity that allowed Sadam to use Iraq's name to squander national wealth.

I would like to expand because some people like metaphors. It is not as simple as the metaphor of the gunmen and the hostages. It is more complicated. Here is more detail to the metaphor: when he took everyone's wallet he called the credit cards companies and even though they knew he was a hostage takes. They extended him credit. Then they required payments from the hostages.
By the way, I appreciate posts done by Safaa. His posts are informative, well argued and of optimal length. They do not slander and are free of fallacies of weak induction which are rampant in some other posts. Also pleas refrain from this dogmatic commitment to ideologies. Example:
X is a bad idea because it is from Y ideology
If you can not logically analyze it and prove the idea wrong, improbable, impractical, based on examining the argument or its premise. Then please go read something and stop writing.

I would like to add to my article. I imagine that some should people be taxed to payoff the Iraqi debt because it is their complicity that allowed Sadam to use Iraq's name to squander national wealth.

ديون كثيرة لكن ليست مستحيلة الدفع


لاشك ان الديون العراقية ثقيلة وسوف ترهق العراق على المدى الطويل ، ولكن الاخطر من هذا هو ان هذه الدول التي كانت قد أسلفت
العراق، بدلا من ان تعتذر فانها تقوم بالضغط على ا لعراق لتحقيق مطامع معينة، ان افضل شيئ تقدمه اهذه الدول تكفيرا عن ذنبها هو اتطفئ هذه الديون اذا كانت جادة في اقامة علاقات سليمة وحقيقية ، ولا أظن هذا سيتحقق

من جهة اخرى ان ديون العراق وان كانت كثيرة جدا لكنها ليست مستحيلة الدفع ، فخيرات العراق تفوق كل الخيرات الموجودة في المنطقة، ثم ان العراق عليه ان يستعمل طرقا للضغط على هذه الدول مثلما تضغط هي عليه أي ان يصارحها بان أمنها وسلامها يتم من خلال حفظ الامن والسلام في العراق، وان هذا صعب المنال اذا كان العراق مثقلا بالديون،