(August 1, 1998) Export Credit Guarantees should, as a rule, only be extended for development purposes. However, increases in export credit guarantees seem to reflect an exporter-driven drive for business, rather than a borrower-driven need for funding.
Environment: NGO’s Denounce World Bank
(March 13, 1998) Italian Non Governmental Organisations (NGOs) accused the World Bank of violating human and environmental rights in the construction of three hydroelectric stations in Argentina – Paraguay, Guatemala and Lesotho.
Probe Alert March 1998
World Bank energy complex creates hell on earth for Indian citizens
Do-good Bank can’t please all
(February 11, 1998) WASHINGTON — When the president of the World Bank, James Wolfensohn, visited Indonesia earlier this month, he expected to offer $600 million in loans to help fight poverty there.
Whose conduct is too vile to sign Canada’s new International Code of Ethics?
(September 21, 1997) In September, at the urging of the federal government, a group of Canadian companies voluntarily agreed to follow a new International Code of Ethics in their overseas activities.
A troubling deposit at World Bank
(November 25, 1995) For 5O years government guarantees have allowed the World Bank and its sister development banks to amass the world’s riskiest loan portfolios. Three months ago, the weakest of these sisters, the African Development Bank, was downgraded. And now for the first time, the World Bank admits that many of its own loans can’t be paid back.
How to kill the World Bank
(December 9, 1994) When the World Bank celebrated its golden anniversary in Madrid in early October, it promised a new and revitalized "vision" to alleviate Third World poverty.
Investment criteria to assure sustainable development, part 2
(November 22, 1994) By endorsing the “sovereign right of each nation to develop its resources” OHII is endorsing governments’ views that it is right to trade off the interests and security of some citizens for some other supposed benefit such as SED.
It’s time to shut down the World Bank
(October 4, 1994) Celebrating its 50th anniversary this year along with the International Monetary Fund, the World Bank was part of the postwar reconstruction program John Maynard Keynes helped set up in 1944. Lord knows what Lord Keynes would make of the World Bank today.
The World Bank’s Finances: An International S&L Crisis
(October 3, 1994) The World Bank, which is celebrating its 50th anniversary this year, has long enjoyed a sound financial reputation. But its AAA credit rating is not justified. Because of the perverse incentives under which the World Bank operates, the quality of its loan portfolio has diminished significantly, and because the bank is backed by rich-country governments, its irresponsible lending exposes Western taxpayers to a possible World Bank bailout on a scale comparable to the U.S. savings-and-loan bailout. That would leave taxpayers in the industrialized countries on the hook for $100 billion; U.S. citizens would be liable for nearly $30 billion.
Patricia Adams
Dai Qing
Fan Xiao
Lawrence Solomon
Mu Lan
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