Paris Club talks slated for next week

Paris Club talks slated for next week

JAKARTA: Indonesia will attend a preliminary round of talks with the Paris Club of official creditors next week ahead of a vital meeting in April where the government will seek to reschedule around $6 billion of debt, an official said on Wednesday.

Indonesia has said it was optimistic it would secure the debt relief, crucial for helping bring down the budget deficit, targeted at 2.5 percent of gross domestic product in 2002.

"These talks with member countries of the Paris Club are a necessary step before the real meeting in April," Mahendra Siregar, a senior economics ministry official, told Reuters.

Finance Minister Boediono and Chief Economics Minister Dorodjatun Kuntjoro-Jakti will leave for Europe on Monday for the week-long talks.

Indonesia's total public debts are estimated at a staggering $136 billion, almost equal to its GDP. This includes some 659 trillion rupiah ($66.03 billion) in domestic debts, which stems mainly from a massive bank bailout at the height of the Asian financial crisis of the late 1990s.

The government has said the $6 billion of official foreign debt it will seek to reschedule includes principal and interest and will mature between April 2002 and December 2003. -- Reuters