Friday 18 November 2011

Pass The Duchy On The Left Hand Side

Specifically, the Duchy of Normandy. For, as The Guardian reports:

Twenty-six hedge funds are demanding over £1bn debt repayments from Africa's poorest countries - more than twice the International Red Cross budget for Africa this year. They are using legal loopholes around the world, including the Channel Island of Jersey.

Their identities may be read here and here.

Neil Clark quotes the wise words of Greg Palast:


I think the focus on Grossman and his fellow carrion chewers is distracting. The destruction of Bosnia's power-pylon industry was the direct consequence of privatising it, bringing the free market to socialist Yugoslavia and Brankovic to power over its debts, allowing him to buy and sell debt securities on the deregulated world financial market.

It was the privatisation of Congo's state cobalt mine and the looting of its riches, all at the behest of the World Bank, IMF and privateers, that drained Congo's treasury.

The Crown Dependencies and certain British Overseas Territories, though thankfully not the one to which I have connections, urgently need sorting out, even if nowhere near as urgently as the City of London.

Their students should pay only home fees to attend British universities. In return, all provision for them to function as tax havens and as bases for this sort of behaviour should be repealed. A very good deal all round.

Except, perhaps, for our dear friend below the line, Tom The Teenage Trot (Retired).

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