Following a meeting held in the European parliament in Brussels organised by the CADTM (committee for the Abolition of the Third World Debt) and two MEPs from the GUE-NGL (European United Left-Nordic Green Left), Marie Christine Vergiat (Front de Gauche) and Gaby Zimmer (Die Linke), and several members of the European and national parliaments belonging to different political affiliations, are launching an appeal calling for the immediate suspension of the EU debt repayment by Tunisia (with frozen interests).

This moratorium cannot wait, during the month of April, the temporary government of Tunisia will have to repay 410 millions of Euros to its creditors, which is the equivalent of 6 years worth of health budgets in Tunisia!

The urgent focus is for Tunisia to put in place democratic institutions, and to mobilise all its financial resources to face the social urgencies that triggered the Tunisian revolution.

It is not acceptable that European creditors continue to demand the repayment of a debt which can largely be considered illegitimate according to international law, and which has mainly profited to the Ben Ali clan rather than the Tunisian people. Furthermore, this debt has largely been reimbursed by Tunisia already, who now are essentially paying interests on previous credits.
 

Before any repayment is made, we should proceed to an audit of the debt in order to determine the share of the debt which did not benefit the people and which must be cancelled.

The European creditors who supported this dictatorship until the very end should learn from their mistakes and give a positive signal to the Tunisian people by immediately suspending the repayment of this debt.

Fathi Chamkhi, member of RAID-ATTAC-CADTM Tunisia, who has launched a campaign in Tunisia for a moratorium on the repayment and an audit of the debt says it is a question of democracy and justice! 

We call on members of parliament across Europe (National and European parliamentarians), to join us in this appeal and put pressure on European institutions.

Marie-Christine Vergiat, MEP Front de Gauche
Gabi Zimmer, MEP Die Linke
CADTM

Strasbourg 4^th of April 2011

Press information :
Renaud Vivien (CADTM) +32 (0) 4 97 04 79 99
Juliette Ryan : +33 (0) 6 78 00 94 73

The Appeal and list of current signatories: http://www.cadtm.org/Call-to-national-and-European-MPs