Question to the Foreign, Commonwealth & Development Office:

To ask the Secretary of State for Foreign, Commonwealth and Development Affairs, what discussions she has had with her European counterparts on tackling the growing debt crisis in low income countries.

HMT lead on international debt policy for the UK government. My Right Honourable colleague, the Chancellor of the Exchequer, regularly discusses low-income country debt with European and Global partners through the G7 and G20. The G20 and Paris Club of international creditors are implementing a landmark Debt Service Suspension Initiative which has so far seen low-income countries suspend over $10 billion of debt repayments since the start of the crisis. The G20 have also launched a Common Framework for Debt Restructuring, also to be implemented with and by the Paris Club, that will provide debt treatments for individual countries that need and apply for this.