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• Author: International Law Group

"Group of Eight" agrees to forgive international indebtedness of 18 poorer nations

On June 11, 2005, during a 2-day summit in London, the world's most prosperous nations, known as the Group of Eight (G8), formally agreed to cancel at least $40 billion of debt owed to international agencies by 18 of the world's poorest lands, the majority of them in Africa. The beneficiaries are Benin, Bolivia, Burkina Faso, Ethiopia, Ghana, Guyana, Honduras, Madagascar, Mali, Mauritania, Mozambique, Nicaragua, Niger, Rwanda, Senegal, Tanzania, Uganda and Zambia. Part of the arrangement is for poor countries to use the money instead for health, education or the relief of poverty. The U.S. had been urging the other members - Britain, Germany, France, Italy, Canada, Japan and Russia - that the best solution to poor countries' indebtedness was to forgive their debt burden entirely rather than merely to lighten it by taking over interest repayments. The U.S. Treasury Secretary said that the Saturday agreement would immediately affect some $40 billion in debt, including servicing costs. The amount it will actually cost the Group of 8 to compensate the international lenders, however, is $16.7 billion. Overall, it is said the 18 states owe international lenders some $55.6 billion.

Citation: The New York Times (online), London, Sunday, June 12, 2005 (byline of Alan Cowell); CBS News report of June 11, 2005, available at www.cbsnews.com; The Washington Post, June 11, 2005.

Roman Polanski wins libel action in London court

On July 22, 2005, a London jury awarded movie mogul, Roman Polanski, £50,000 damages in a libel action. Polanski, 71, had sued over a July 2002 Vanity Fair story which alleged that he had made a pass at a Swedish model in Elaine's restaurant in New York just after the August 1969 murder of his pregnant wife, Sharon Tate, by the Manson Gang. See 2005 International Law Update 39. The jury concluded that the magazine publisher, Conde Nast, had not proved that the words complained of were substantially true. The plaintiff did not appear in his own trial except on video from France because he was afraid of being extradited to the U.S. He had fled the U.S. in 1978 before he could be sentenced on a California conviction for...