wfn.org | Human Rights: LWF in joint call for debt cancellation

[FRANK_IMHOFF.parti@ecunet.org (FRANK IMHOFF)]

UNCHR urged to sharpen its message on foreign debt and human rights

GENEVA, 20 April 1999 (lwi)   The Lutheran World Federation (LWF)
jointly with the Conference of European Churches (CEC) and
Franciscans International, has asked the 55th Session of the United
Nations Commission on Human Rights (UNCHR) meeting here from 22 March
to 30 April to sharpen its message on foreign debt and human rights,
and call for the outright cancellation of the unsustainable debts of
the world's poorest countries by the year 2000.

In their joint statement presented to the UNCHR, the three church
organizations underline that the year 2000 represents a "spiritual
and psychological kairos" which "provides an unrepeatable opportunity
to muster the political will to provide a new and debt-free start for
the peoples of the world's poorest countries."

The church bodies welcome last year's appointment of a Special
Rapporteur on the effects of foreign debt on the full enjoyment of
economic, social and cultural rights and point out that insofar as
the enjoyment of such rights and of the right to development is
denied to millions of people in heavily indebted developing countries
as a result of crippling debt service obligations, the continued
enforcement of those conditions constitutes a massive and systemic
violation of human rights.

Referring to the Heavily Indebted Poor Countries (HIPC) Initiative of
the World Bank and the International Monetary Fund (IMF), which in
principle seeks a reduction of the unsustainable multilateral debt of
the world's poorest countries, the three organizations present
situational analyses of the HIPC Initiative in Mozambique, Uganda and
Guyana, and conclude that the initiative in its current form and
practice is a far from adequate tool in addressing the debt crisis in
many developing countries, "and that the Special Rapporteur will have
much to do."

The Lutheran World Federation and Franciscans International also
organized two meetings on foreign debt and human rights during the
ongoing session of the UNCHR. On 8 April 1999, they jointly convened
a meeting which brought together the UN Special Rapporteur on foreign
debt and human rights, the Deputy Director of Jubilee 2000 UK, and
key government and church-based NGO representatives. In another joint
forum on 14 April 1999, the executive staff of the World Bank
responsible for the HIPC initiative participated, by video link, in a
discussion with NGO and government representatives, and with the
Special Rapporteur.

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Lutheran World Information
Assistant Editor, English: Pauline Mumia
E-mail: pmu@lutheranworld.org
http://www.lutheranworld.org/