We won’t pay $1.5bn to US: Cristina Fernandez
The Unhived Mind
We won’t pay $1.5bn to US: Cristina Fernandez
Tue Jun 17, 2014 3:18PM GMT
http://www.presstv.ir/detail/2014/06/17/367383/argentina-not-to-pay-15bn-to-us/
Argentina President Cristina Fernandez de Kirchner says her country refuses to go along with a US judge’s ruling requiring a USD 1.5 billion repayment of defaulted bonds.
Argentina cannot pay the disputed bonds in full but is still willing to remain at the negotiating table, said the president during a national address Monday night.
The statement came hours after the US Supreme Court refused to hear Argentina’s appeal and left the order in place.
US District Court Judge Thomas Griesa ordered Argentina to pay USD 1.5 billion “all together, without quotas, right away, now, in cash, ahead of all the rest” of bondholders, Fernandez said.
“This represents a profit of 1,608 percent, in dollars! I believe that in all of organized crime there has never been a case of a profit of 1,608 percent in such a short time…What I cannot do as president is submit the country to such extortion,” she added.
Cristina Fernandez said, however, that she is working on ways to fulfill Argentina’s commitments to other creditors who purchased Argentine bonds after the country’s 2001 default.
Argentina has the next two weeks to pay USD 907 million to the US plaintiffs or risk a court order forcing US banks not to process Argentina’s June 30 payment totaling an equal amount to all the other bondholders.
The South American country may also lose use of the US financial system.
In 2001, Argentina defaulted on a sum of around USD 100 billion. It has since twice restructured its debt in 2005 and in 2010.
http://theunhivedmind.com/wordpress3/2014/06/18/we-wont-pay-1-5bn-to-us-cristina-fernandez/