Request to sign debt ad for National Catholic Reporter

[Robert Weissman <rob@essential.org>]

This is from Quest for Peace:

Dear Friends,

Quest for Peace has decided to take out a full page ad in the National
Catholic Reporter on the issue of debt. We would
welcome signatures of your organization. If your organization would like
to appear on this ad, please respond to us by
Wednesday August 25th at 5pm.

Sorry that this is on such a short time schedule, but the deadline for
the ad to NCR is Friday August 27th.

The ad will appear on Friday September 10th. To help cover costs we
would appreciate if you could send us a donation of
$35. Feel free to give more if you are able, and to still send your
organizations information if you are not. For $100 we will put
your organization's name in bold. Checks can be made out to Quest for
Peace and sent to P.O. Box 5206, Hyattsville, MD
20782. Donations can be sent after the deadline of the ad!  Thank you.

Please contact Marie Clarke with any questions, or to request to
say a formatted version of the ad. Marie can be reached at 301-699-0042
or mariec@quixote.org.



NAME OF ORGANIZATION: __________________________________


WILL YOU CONDEMN US TO DEBT? 

The jubilee call is not to loosen the chains of debt but to break them^


 In countries like Nicaragua, where the $6 billion external debt equals
six times the Gross Domestic Product, the government
has entered into Structural Adjustment Programs (SAPs) created by the
International Monetary Fund (IMF) in order to
receive debt relief under the Heavily Indebted Poor Countries Initiative
(HIPC). Under SAPs money is taken from health care
and education to pay back the debt. In a country where 74% of the people
live in poverty, and 68% of the population is under
the age of 25, these policies are deadly and steal the futures of the
youth.

 In Ecuador, the people have begun to reclaim their country with major
protests after struggling for only four months under the
austerity measures imposed by the IMF under their program of Structural
Adjustment. As the poor have marched to the capital
with their message of desperation, thirteen protesters have been shot
and four hundred arrested.

 The IMF has required Ecuador to remove government subsidies and to open
their markets causing inflation of food costs by
70% while the basic wage has increased by only 30%. Ecuadorians watch as
they begin to import increasing amounts of basic
needs and the prices of the items they can export fluctuate dramatically
and their environment is destroyed by the necessity to
grow more bananas, farm more shrimp and pump more oil.  SAPs are a
failed attempt to create sustainable development and
instead condemn the poor to suffering and misery.

 Fourty-one countries qualify for HIPC. In response to an international
cry for debt cancellation, Congressman Leach has
introduced H.R. 1095, the ^Debt Relief for Poverty Reduction Act^. This
bill admirably calls for a cancellation of the bi-lateral
debt owed by the South to the United States. The multi-lateral debt
section of the bill, however, still allows for countries to
struggle under the oppressive regulations of SAPs for three years as
opposed to the currently required six. Further, the bill
funds the International Monetary Fund, while only urging for some
changes in their deadly structural adjustment policies. H.R.
1095 might loosen the chains of debt, but they will not break them.

 Three years of SAPs are enough to destroy an economy, while at the same
time further magnifying suffering. How many more
will die from poverty related hunger and illness during three years of
structural adjustment? CALL your Congressperson NOW
and urge her/him to make the following changes to HR 1095 to truly break
the chains of debt!

? Require that access to debt relief be delinked from compliance with
IMF structural adjustment policies as a prior condition of
any United States funding for HIPC.
 AND
? Require that any waiting period for access to debt relief be
eliminated as a prior condition of any United States funding for
HIPC.

The Capitol Switchboard Number is 202-224-3121

 Without these amendments, H.R. 1095 falls short of its professed goal,
and will only keep countries chained to debt and
structural adjustment policies that keep these countries from
sustainable development.