G8. One year on
On July 15th leaders of Canada, France, Germany, Italy, Japan, Russia, the United Kingdom, and the United States will meet in St. Petersburg.
Collectively they're known as the G8 and it's just over a year since this same group gathered in Gleneagles, Scotland while simultaneously in London a middle-aged Irish rocker hectored them about dropping debt to certain African nations.
We're going to air a special G8 anniversary show and we want to know what you'd like covered?
I've listed some starting points below -- take a moment to follow the links for some provocative and interesting points of view -- but we want to know what you'd like to debate one year on from Gleneagles.
- Does dropping unsustainable debt to African countries really help them, or it just a way of letting corrupt dictators off the hook? Robert Calderisi describes some of the worst excesses of Africa's 'big men' while last year journalist Matthew Parris let off a considerable amount of steam on the same topic . . . Charles Onyango-Obbo covered it for the Kenyan Daily Nation.
- It's only been a year but already signs of improvement are there. Bob Geldof and the DATA organisation's own status report was released just a week ago: "There is good news on debt cancellation - the G8 are on track to meet their committments." If you're feeling up for it then the full 100 pages is available here. Stephen Rand of the Jubilee Debt Campaign says much has been done but there is more to do. Jubilee have given the G8 a first year report card. You can download it here
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