The let­ter will be open to addi­tional Mem­bers of Con­gress until the close of busi­ness on Mon­day, Feb­ru­ary 1^st.  Urge your rep to sign now!

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Jan­u­ary 27, 2010

Urge Trea­sury to Support

Debt Can­cel­la­tion for Haiti

Dear Col­league:

We ask you to join us in send­ing a let­ter to the Hon­or­able Tim­o­thy Gei­th­ner, Sec­re­tary of the Trea­sury, to urge him to sup­port can­cel­ing Haiti’s debts in the after­math of the dev­as­tat­ing earth­quake that occurred on Jan­u­ary 12, 2010.

The Gov­ern­ment of Haiti can­not afford to invest in human­i­tar­ian relief, recon­struc­tion and devel­op­ment efforts, while con­tin­u­ing to make pay­ments on debts owed to mul­ti­lat­eral finan­cial insti­tu­tions like the Inter­na­tional Mon­e­tary Fund (IMF), the World Bank, and the Inter-American Devel­op­ment Bank.  Even before the earth­quake, debt ser­vice pay­ments to these insti­tu­tions were a tremen­dous bur­den that inter­fered with the abil­ity of the Gov­ern­ment of Haiti to meet the needs of its people.

We are urg­ing Sec­re­tary Gei­th­ner to sup­port three spe­cific actions that should be a part of the inter­na­tional community’s response to this ter­ri­ble tragedy:  (1) the com­plete can­cel­la­tion of  all remain­ing debts owed by Haiti to mul­ti­lat­eral finan­cial insti­tu­tions, (2) the sus­pen­sion of Haiti’s debt ser­vice pay­ments to these insti­tu­tions until such time as the debts are can­celed, and (3) the pro­vi­sion of addi­tional assis­tance to Haiti in the form of grants so that the coun­try does not accu­mu­late addi­tional debts.

Please join us in urg­ing Sec­re­tary Gei­th­ner to sup­port debt can­cel­la­tion for Haiti and allow the Gov­ern­ment of Haiti to use its mea­ger resources for the needs of its peo­ple.  The let­ter is on the reverse.  If you have any ques­tions or would like to sign on to the let­ter, please con­tact Kath­leen Sen­g­stock of Con­gress­woman Waters’ staff at 52201.

Sin­cerely,

______________________________          ______________________________

Max­ine Waters                                           Ileana Ros-Lehtinen

______________________________          ______________________________

William Delahunt                                                Don­ald Payne

______________________________

Bar­bara Lee

Jan­u­ary __, 2010

The Hon­or­able Tim­o­thy Geithner

Sec­re­tary of the Treasury

Dear Sec­re­tary Geithner:

We are cer­tain that you share our con­cern for the peo­ple of Haiti in the after­math of the dev­as­tat­ing earth­quake that occurred on Jan­u­ary 12, 2010.

We are writ­ing today to urge you to sup­port three spe­cific actions that should be a part of the inter­na­tional community’s response to this ter­ri­ble tragedy:  (1) the com­plete can­cel­la­tion of  all remain­ing debts owed by Haiti to mul­ti­lat­eral finan­cial insti­tu­tions, (2) the sus­pen­sion of Haiti’s debt ser­vice pay­ments to these insti­tu­tions until such time as the debts are can­celed, and (3) the pro­vi­sion of addi­tional assis­tance to Haiti in the form of grants so that the coun­try does not accu­mu­late addi­tional debts.

As you know, in June of 2009, Haiti secured $1.2 bil­lion in debt can­cel­la­tion from its major cred­i­tors when it reached the com­ple­tion point in the Heav­ily Indebted Poor Coun­tries (HIPC) Ini­tia­tive.  This was a crit­i­cal step for­ward.  But even after this relief, Haiti still owes a total of $709 mil­lion in debts to mul­ti­lat­eral finan­cial insti­tu­tions, includ­ing $447 mil­lion to the Inter-American Devel­op­ment Bank (IDB), $165 mil­lion to the Inter­na­tional Mon­e­tary Fund (IMF), $39 mil­lion to the World Bank, and $58 mil­lion to the Inter­na­tional Fund for Agri­cul­tural Devel­op­ment (IFAD).

We wel­come recent state­ments from offi­cials at the mul­ti­lat­eral finan­cial insti­tu­tions of their inten­tions to con­sider can­cel­la­tion of Haiti’s remain­ing debts.  We urge you to use the voice and vote of the United States on the Exec­u­tive Boards of these insti­tu­tions to secure can­cel­la­tion of all of Haiti’s remain­ing mul­ti­lat­eral debts.  While arrange­ments are worked out for can­cel­la­tion, we urge you to sup­port a mora­to­rium on debt ser­vice pay­ments from Haiti to these insti­tu­tions, with­out the accrual of interest.

We also wel­come the pledges of addi­tional finan­cial assis­tance from inter­na­tional gov­ern­ments and mul­ti­lat­eral finan­cial insti­tu­tions, as it is crit­i­cal that all avail­able resources be deliv­ered to Haiti as quickly as pos­si­ble.  How­ever, we urge that all assis­tance be in the form of grants instead of new loans.

Specif­i­cally, we strongly urge you to work to ensure that the $100 mil­lion loan offered to Haiti by the IMF be pro­vided on terms com­pa­ra­ble to a grant and with­out oner­ous con­di­tions.  We are encour­aged by IMF Man­ag­ing Direc­tor Dominique Strauss-Kahn’s recent state­ment that the IMF intends to work to can­cel all of Haiti’s debts includ­ing this new loan.  We urge you to work with the IMF and the other mul­ti­lat­eral finan­cial insti­tu­tions to make this happen.

Debt can­cel­la­tion will allow the Gov­ern­ment of Haiti to use its mea­ger resources for essen­tial human­i­tar­ian relief, recon­struc­tion and devel­op­ment efforts.  We thank you for your con­sid­er­a­tion of our views on this crit­i­cal issue.

Sin­cerely,

cc:     Dominique Strauss-Kahn, Man­ag­ing Direc­tor of the IMF

Mr. Robert B. Zoel­lick, Pres­i­dent of the World Bank
Mr. Luis Alberto Moreno, Pres­i­dent of the IDB

Mr. Kanayo F. Nwanze, Pres­i­dent of IFAD