MADRID - Argentine President Nestor Kirchner promised Thursday that his country would pay its billion-dollar Paris Club debt to Spain, even though one reason for his visit was to re-negotiate its repayment schedule.
"We are going to pay because it is our moral and economic obligation. We must deal with the circumstances".
Spain loaned Argentina 1.0 billion euros (794,000 dollars) in 2001 when the South American country was stuck in a financial crisis.
Although the Argentinian economy posted first-quarter 2006 growth of 8.6 percent, Kirchner said the country was still "in hell" and that he hoped that by the end of his mandate next year it would be "at the gates of purgatory".
Created in 1956 during a meeting in the French capital of creditor nations for Argentina, the 19 Paris Club members, spanning the globe from Germany and Switzerland to Japan and the United States, have forged some 400 agreements worth about 500 billion dollars in its 50-year history.
06/22/2006 12:58 GMT