With an Eye on China, G7 Finance Ministers Call on G20 Bilateral Creditors to Keep Their Debt Freeze Promises

US Secretary of the Treasury Steven Mnuchin testifies before the House Financial Services Committee on Capitol Hill on June 30, 2020 in Washington, DC. Tasos Katopodis / POOL / AFP

U.S. Treasury Secretary Steven Mnuchin hosted a teleconference with his fellow finance ministers from the Group of Seven rich countries on Monday and the burgeoning debt crisis in the world’s poorest countries was high on the agenda. 

The finance chiefs called on G20 creditors to make good on their promises to suspend repayments for highly indebted countries. This was widely interpreted by some economists as a subtle critique of the Chinese who’ve been reluctant to freeze repayments of loans from one of its policy banks, the China Development Bank (CDB), as well as loans extended to African borrowers from some state-owned enterprises.

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by Eric Olander

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