Western creditors suspend debt relief to Sudan over coup as country’s economy sinks
The Paris Club of major creditors announced the suspension of a 2021 agreement with the now-deposed transitional government to restructure the large foreign debt of Sudan.
Reacting for the first time to last October’s military coup, the Paris Club of major official creditor countries announced June 14 the suspension of the bilateral agreements signed a year earlier with the now-deposed transitional government of Sudan to initiate an ambitious process of restructuring the country’s large external public debt.
The group of rich countries stated in its annual report for 2021 that, in light of the recent events in Sudan and the removal of the transitional government by the military forces, its members assessed that agreements to implement the debt restructuring program cannot be signed until the situation improves and the country resumes its program with the International Monetary Fund (IMF). The stock of debt owed by Sudan to the Paris Club creditors, an informal group whose declared objective is to find solutions to payment problems faced by debtor nations, amounted to some $23.5 billion at the end of 2020.
