Around 1,300 people have already voted in Reykjavik in the Icesave referendum as they live overseas or will be unavailable next Saturday. Everyone else in Iceland has to wait a further nine days until the polling stations open.
Absentee voters are also casting their ‘yes’ or ‘no’ votes at district commissioners’ offices around the country. There are 230,014 people registered to vote in the referendum.
Despite some politicians’ hopes that renegotiation of the Icesave deal would get in the way, it now seem highly likely the referendum will go ahead as planned with polls consistently suggesting the December law will be rejected by voters.
An information booklet on the referendum will be delivered to every house in Iceland and information can also be found on www.thjodaratkvaedi.is, RUV reports.
Fixed link (missing k): http://www.thjodaratkvaedi.is/
Bye-bye current coalition government …
Pity Islandic negotiators could not accept the best offer of UK/NL, whcih to me seemed quite reasonable and comparable to loans by Norway which also were acceptable to Iceland. Why this is happening is poorly being communicated though.
This issue is dragging along for far too long damaging all involved, and the confidence in Iceland in particular. The referendum will likely cause the fall of the government and give more delays. Missed chance!
The End of the World is Nigh.
To Ralph:
From the news here in Iceland it looks like this “best offer” was not even close to what they were talking about last week. It did not contain any solution to the Ragnar Hall issue. As been pointed out here before, the Ragnar Hall is one of the critical issues that needs to be resolved, if there is going to be any acceptance of the Icesave agreement.
It may very well look “reasonable” to you that Iceland is being forced to pay lot MORE than the 20K per depositor specified by the EU Directive. But it certainly does not look so reasonable to the people here in Iceland, which are being asked to pay for this.
Until the UK/NL negotiators are willing to start discuss the REAL issues we have with the current Icesave agreement, there simply will NOT be any agreement.
You are right though on your final point, that this indeed is a missed chance, for EVERYONE involved!
I spleen overseas mostly…
“Until the UK/NL negotiators are willing to start discuss the REAL issues we have with the current Icesave agreement, there simply will NOT be any agreement.”
The only thing Iceland is interested in is consessions.
Please explain to me why Iceland doesn’t simply repay the debt without conditions. Why are you linking it to the disposal of assets of the failed bank?
To Bjarni:
it is a pity that the pretext given by the Icelandic delegation for rejecting the offer was the interest rate on offer, and not the Ragnar Hall issue. I agree, a missed opportunity to get a better agreement, or at least focus on the heart of the problem. Let us hope that they get back to some real negotiations soon. I detect considerable frustration in the statements made by the British negotiators that the Icelandic position keeps changing.
Let us hope that both sides get back together as soon as possible.
To Peter-London/Krakow:
First of all, this “debt” you are referring to is based on unilateral decisions the governments of UK/Netherlands took, when they decided to pay out in advance to the full (above 20K) deposit guarantee of the depositors in their own countries.
Until Iceland signs an Icesave agreement that is subsequently ratified according to the Icelandic constitution, there is NO DEBT. It does not matter whether the UK/Dutch government believes in their own mind, until we have an Icesave agreement that is accepted by ALL parties there is no debt.
Iceland does not have any extra few billion Euros floating around somewhere to pay the 20K deposit guarantee, as specified in the EU Directive. Therefore the ONLY way this 20K obligation can be paid, is to use the assets of the bankrupt LBI to cover it. Everyone with minimal knowledge of Iceland’s finances already KNOWS this, so there is NO QUESTION that “linking it to the disposal of assets of the failed bank” is indeed necessary.
‘Iceland does not have any extra few billion Euros floating around somewhere to pay the 20K deposit guarantee’
When you are poor and can’t pay your debts, the honourable thing to do is declare bankruptcy, make the best possible accomodation with your creditors then move forward. Iceland seems to want to carry on as if nothing has happened and hope everyone just forgets about the debts because the Icelanders are such lovable plucky characters.
These are the same people who will tell you they are broke and can’t pay their debts but have the arrogance to send clothes to UK pensioners as if they are so much better than us.
Until Iceland signs an Icesave agreement that is subsequently ratified according to the Icelandic constitution, there is NO DEBT.
Not strictly true. The fact of the debt can be established outside of Iceland. Of course, Iceland can then choose to ignore it, but that would then have consequences.
Likewise, your point about “the ONLY way this 20K obligation can be paid, is to use the assets of the bankrupt LBI to cover it” isn’t true either. It can also be paid by borrowing the money and then paying that off over time.
That may look like splitting hairs, but it’s the very point that has held up the negotiations for a substantial time.
“Until Iceland signs an Icesave agreement that is subsequently ratified according to the Icelandic constitution, there is NO DEBT.”
Interesting mindset, as I said, good luck with persuading anyone outside Iceland with that idea.
—statements made by the British negotiators: the Icelandic position keeps changing…
“He’s on his back, it looks like down for the count… No, he’s sitting up… He’s on his hands and knees! He’s trying to stand! He’s on his feet, swaying, but he’s up! Dammit, Dutch, the guy keeps changing his position!”
“It’s the referee’s slow, J.B. If he could’a counted faster we’d a’ had ‘im…”
I guess the difference is where you put your money…
I am with Bjarni 100,000%! Debt? What debt? There is no debt. ‘Debt’ is a metaphysical construct. If a tree falls in the forest and no one hears it fall, did it fall? Of course not. Same with debt. If a debt falls due in the woods but no one hears it mature, what then? Iceland (as we all know) has no forests. Hence, no trees. Hence, no debt. This basic logic is known by all U. of Iceland graduates. Cousin Fisy will, I believe, back up my story.
Afram!
Gummi
Sent from Gummi’s Blackberry in Bangkok
Expect typos
To Bromley86:
Then the question becomes exactly which country would really be willing to loan us 4.0B Euros, so we can pay this so-called Icesave “debt”?
In the end, that loan would also have to be paid back by the recoveries of Landsbanki, so we are right back where we started. The only difference would be that a different country would then bear the final loss, if we cannot fully pay back the loan.
To Andy,
Yes, declaring bankruptcy would absolutely be the right thing to do for Iceland in this situation, but unfortunately there are no bankruptcy laws for countries. As a result sovereign defaults are typically very messy affairs.
@ Bjarni
Respectfully, you’ve made quite a few comments to the effect that of course Iceland will repay the debt- that the terms were the only issue etc.
e.g.: “Second, Iceland has already committed to pay for the IceSave guarantee when it passed the earlier laws last August. The real dispute is what the actual economic terms will be on the repayment and whether the Icelandic bankruptcy laws will be applied correctly.”
Now it seems that you hold the existence of this “so-called debt” in question. You have an excellent grasp of the details of the issue- far better than mine- perhaps to the degree that they are eclipsing the big picture. The tree has fallen in somebody else’s forest, and they did hear it. Whimsical intellectual contortions notwithstanding, this debt will likely exact it’s toll by one means or another no matter what you say, think, or do. The train has left the station…
On a brighter note, what’s the old saying… “if you owe somebody 2k, they own you. If you owe somebody 873,983k, you own them.”
Bjarni you said:
“Until Iceland signs an Icesave agreement that is subsequently ratified according to the Icelandic constitution, there is NO DEBT. It does not matter whether the UK/Dutch government believes in their own mind, until we have an Icesave agreement that is accepted by ALL parties there is no debt.
”
I do not agree on that one.There IS a debt but there is no agreement on the repayment of it.
These are different matters.
When the icelandic state takes a loan the loan must go trough the parliament, if it passes trough laws are issues granting the states approval, if the public sees no reason to oppose this the president signes the law and the law becomes valid, no one on earth has the power to take loans on behalf of the Icelandic state except the parliament, this includes Gordon Brown.
No icesave loan exists, its as simple as that,
if someone does not agree, i dare him to show us some information to back the claim, any information.
One reason why we have been arguing here since 08 is that no loan has been issued.
True Axel, but none of that changes the ability of a debt to arise. For example, say it goes to an EU court and that court rules that the debt exists. That means that it exists as far as the EU is concerned (not the loan, the debt).
What happens in Iceland at that stage merely affects how the debt is collected, not it’s existence.
We are repeatedly told that the Icelandic government has accepted the existence of the debt. However it’s becoming increasingly obvious that even within the government that is not the case (it certainly never has been the case with the people or the opposition). Instead the acceptace of the liability is merely seen in Iceland as a negotiable item.
As a UK taxpayer and voter, I would like to ask a question of any Icelandic taxpayer and voter reading this. The issue of where the responsibility for the Icesave debt falls basically boils down to who is responsible for the actions of Landsbankii in trying to improve their balance sheet via high-interest savings accounts in the UK and NL, advertised online with an explicit 20K euro guarantee as per the EEA/EFTA regualtions for branch offices. My question is this, if the marketing of these accounts as guaranteed to the 20K threshold was patently wrong given the small size of the Icelandic economy, and anyone who put their money into such an account deserves the consequences, why have you just elected to the Althingi a person who was primarily involved in devising that marketing strategy? Do you see her as some kind of Robin Hood to steal the money of rich UK and NL citizens to give to the poor of Iceland?
Axel
“When the icelandic state takes a loan the loan must go trough the parliament, ”
Then you should of never of allowed you government to take out a debt in the past. In fact your government is doing it all the time without specific permission from Parliament. Have a look at http://www.bonds.is, you will see that your government sold bonds a few days ago. No vote in parliament on that.
If you have a problem with the actions of your government, you should
take it up with them and tell them to stop taking debt on your behalf. Nothing to do do with your lenders who will expect to be paid back.
BTW, you may also want to announce that all the government bonds that they are worthless and won’t be paid. Most of these currently sold will be to Icelandic organisations I expect. I expect the pension funds and banks who hold them will be screwed and stop buying Icelandic government debt, in the case of the banks they will probably have to shut down completely.
I think one of the main pronlems now for the british, is that it looks like this tiny little nation in the middle of the atlantic, with not even a military, is going to expose them and defeat them once again(Cod wars). Because now there is something for sure, IF Iceland pays its going to be under it´s terms and conditions. And that is IF Iceland pays.
Having said that, I accept that the most honorable thing to do for iceland is to declare bankrupcy, for on single reason, we are bankrupt. But I think we are to proud(I don´t get why, we should be ashamed)to accepte it. But the situation itself will force people to accept it.
To G.Johnson:
The difference here is between the meaning of the words “obligation” and “debt”, which is quite important.
The Icelandic government has committed, through the Brussel guidelines, to take on the “obligation” of guaranteeing 20K for each depositor in Icesave, in turn for promise from EU/UK/NL that the negotiations “shall take into account the unprecedented difficult situation of Iceland and therefore the necessity of finding arrangements that allow Iceland to restore its financial system and its economy.” This commitment by Iceland stands and we are not walking away from it. But it is dependent on EU/UK/NL also standing by their side of the bargain.
In order to fulfill this obligation we have for the past 10 months entered into lengthy negotiations with UK/Netherlands to receive a loan for 4.0B Euros over 15 year period, while we wait for the Landsbanki bankruptcy recoveries to be paid out.
These negotiations have now failed (assuming the agreement is voted down in the referendum), which means there is no loan agreement (assuming that UK/Netherlands will not accept the August 2009 laws with the amendments). If there is no loan agreement then there is no debt. This is like with any other contract negotiations, until an agreement is actually signed and ratified, there is no agreement.
What is happening now is that we are actually going backwards, unwinding all the work that has been done in the past 8 months. If everything goes badly we will basically end up back on square one, with only the Brussel guidelines from November 2008 left standing.
If the Icesave agreement laws are not passed, there is no legal way, according to the constitution, for the Icelandic government to take over the deposit guarantee from TIF. I have been warning about this potential disaster outcome for months now, so let me say this again:
If UK/Netherlands want to get paid anything from the Icelandic government in addition to the LBI recoveries (6.4B Euros), they should do everything in their power to make sure this does not go to the referendum. If it does and the laws are voted down, basically all bets are off, due to the ensuing political situation in Iceland.
To Bromley86:
Actually a key point. This matter has NOT gone to an EU court and there has been no such ruling that the debt exists.
As we have said all along, we would be perfectly happy putting this matter in front of an independent EU court, where each country can put forth their legal case. If we loose the case, then there is debt, but if we win, then there is no debt.
But until this happens, or alternatively a loan agreement is signed and ratified, there is no debt in the legal meaning of the word.
To Andy:
It would be better to know exactly who you are referring to, so we can discuss the particular actions of this person, you are claiming stole from “rich UK and NL citizens” to give to the “poor of Iceland”. Do you have any documented facts on this?
But generally speaking I can make at least 2 points:
1. It is clear, especially with hindsight, that many of the claims of Landsbanki management before the crash, were basically wrong. If you feel that these claims constitute criminal wrongdoing by any of the people involved, feel free to prosecute them to the fullest extent of the laws in UK. We currently have 100′s of investigations ongoing in Iceland that are working their way through the legal system and hopefully we will start seeing some results later this year.
2. As we have discussed here before, the current political system in Iceland has many problems, some of which played a major role in creating the environment that allowed the crash to happen. Like in many other countries, this system is very entrenched and is far from easy to change. Just removing the previous government from power, which didn’t think they had done anything wrong, took many months of protests, but in the end the will of the people won.
As for electing or not electing a specific person, the current system does not make that easy. Few months before the election, there is a primary, where members of each party elect which people are on the list and in which order. This looks very democratic, but as anyone that is familiar with primaries, this process can be easily gamed by the parties themselves.
For decades, we have had what is called “fjorflokkurinn”, which is basically four main parties that divide the power between them. Regularly, there are new parties started (for example the People’s Movement in the last election), but those typically crash and burn within few years, so nothing changes.
When the day of the election comes, the voters can only choose the lists from the parties, not individuals. There is a lot of dissatisfaction in Iceland with the current system, especially now in the aftermath of the crash. There is currently a strong push the people in Iceland to implement at least some way for the voters to either cross of names or add new names, even choose individuals from different parties.
In order to change the election process, the election laws have to be changed. But these changes are opposed by many of the ‘old-guard’ in the four parties, as this would potentially lessen their hold on power. So it remains to be seen if this change will happen, but the pressure is on.
In the meantime, this means that we have no real control over which individuals we can vote for, only predefined lists that are put together before the election.
What some people seem to be forgetting, is that UK/NL had amble chance to put forward an agreement anytime in the past 8 months, that would have been acceptable to the Icelandic people. Instead they persisted in making their unreasonable demands, that Iceland pay more than the 20K deposit guarantee, to cover their own costs of guaranteeing deposits over 20K.
As mentioned before, by doing this, UK/Netherlands were basically making a double or nothing bet. If this strategy had worked, they would have benefited greatly at the expense of the Icelandic people. Now on the other hand this seems to have backfired badly, and they have in effect lost the gamble.
Rest assured, we all know Iceland will also loose greatly because of this, possibly even ending up with sovereign default. But it does not change the facts on the ground.
Unless an agreement is put forward that is considered acceptable to the Icelandic people, and it is signed and ratified according to the Icelandic constitution, there is no legal way to make any additional payments from the Icelandic government on top of the LBI bankruptcy recoveries.
After the referendum has been held and the current agreements voted down, the chances of this happening are unfortunately going to be much, much lower than before. Everyone, including both UK and Netherlands, as well as Iceland will have to live with the consequences.
The governments in UK/Netherlands made the fundamental mistake from the beginning of listening only to the Icelandic government, which basically has agreed with their point of view. During the negotiations, they then used their strong negotiation advantage to dictate additional terms into the “loan” agreement, that the Icelandic negotiation team subsequently accepted (big mistake).
What UK/Netherlands didn’t count on, is that the population of Iceland would actually want to read the agreements. They even tried to make sure the agreements would be kept secret from both MP’s Althingi and the people. But the agreements were leaked, and a fierce opposition rose up in Iceland to the actual terms of the agreements.
When this happened UK/Netherlands should have realized that the game was up and the current Icesave agreements as negotiated, could not be accepted in Iceland. Instead they persisted with the Icelandic government and tried to get amended agreements through, that did not resolve the issues causing the opposition.
This gambit almost worked, but in the end the Icelandic President came through for the will of the people and sent the Icesave agreement laws to a national referendum.
The UK/Netherland governments then said they would only negotiate with Iceland again if both the government and the opposition would participate. This was actually a positive step, since this ensured that the real issues with the Icesave agreements would finally be taken up and discussed.
But instead of listening to the representatives of the opposition parties, the UK/Netherland negotiation teams expressed surprise that the Icelandic position had “changed”. Of course, the position had changed, since now they were finally talking to the people that were against the current agreements, not only the Icelandic government that always agreed with them.
I will try to make this as clear as I can: The current Icesave agreements are now dead (assuming the referendum votes them down next week). Whatever was negotiated there is gone and will not come back. There was a possibility to fix the real problems with the agreements in the past few weeks, but this opportunity was blown away through sheer ignorance, stupidity and greed.
After the referendum, if there is interest in renewing the negotiations, we will have no other option than to start over from scratch. And there will be much lower chances of success, due to the new political situations in all three countries involved.
Says Bjarni: “The difference here is between the meaning of the words “obligation” and “debt”, which is quite important.”
Well said,Bjarni! Let’s stick to the same story. That way the foreigners will never steal our goods.
As I so accurately noted several months ago: “We Icelanders always pay our debts! Just give us some time to define the word ‘debt’, the word ‘pay’, the word ‘our’, and the word ‘always’. Patience please. (We will define that as well.)”
Afram!
Gummi
To Peter – London/Krakow:
As usual you are mistaken, as you do not bother to check the facts before stating them. In fact the Icelandic government ALWAYS has to get authorization from Althingi before it can take ANY loans or issue any bonds or guarantees. Typically this authorization is given as part of the public finance laws (fjárlög) that are passed each year. For reference here are the 2010 public finance laws that are currently being debated:
http://www.althingi.is/dba-bin/unds.pl?txti=/wwwtext/html/138/s/0383.html&leito=l%E1nl%E1nal%E1nannal%E1nil%E1ninl%E1ninul%E1ni%F0l%E1nsl%E1nsinsl%E1numl%E1nunum#word1
If you just search for the word “lán” or translate it through google, you will see that authorization requests for loans is very prevalent in there.
If the loan is not authorized as part of the public finance laws it is also possible get specific authorization through additional laws. Here is a sample of these kind of laws (60/2008):
http://www.althingi.is/dba-bin/unds.pl?txti=/wwwtext/html/lagasofn/138a/2008060.html&leito=l%E1nl%E1nal%E1nannal%E1nil%E1ninl%E1ninul%E1ni%F0l%E1nsl%E1nsinsl%E1numl%E1nunum#word1
@ bjarni,
I think i understand your position, but I don’t know that you are entitled to credibly speak to the best interests of both sides on this issue:
“If the UK/Netherlands want to get paid anything from the Icelandic government in addition to the LBI recoveries (6.4B Euros), they should…”
Perhaps, like you are calculating that if they want anything at all they should accept your terms, the UK/NL are calculating that the Icesave issue is a relatively small proportion of Iceland’s financial problems and that the longer term health of your economy will be determined by other issues. Issues like the terms at which you’re able to borrow/bond to raise the capital necessary for growth (and subsistence), IMF assistance, not being shunned by counterparties, and other collateral damage which clearly depends on resolving this issue. It could be argued that you can’t afford not to pay this…obligation.
And concerning the risk factor: “or all bets are off”, I believe that the UK and NL came to that conclusion quite some time ago.
CORRECTION:
The first link I gave to Fjárlög 2010, doesn´t really point to the full document. Instead the full bill (523 pages) can be found here:
http://www.althingi.is/altext/138/s/pdf/0001.pdf
It is actually easier to visit the special web site on Fjárlög:
http://hamar.stjr.is
To get to the actual law articles that cover loans and guarantees, select first (1) Fjárreiðuyfirlit, then select “Lagagreinar”, and finally “5. gr Lántökur, endurgreiðslur, og ríkisábyrgðir”. The actual direct link is:
http://hamar.stjr.is/Fjarlagavefur-Hluti-II/Fjarreiduyfirlit/Lagagreinar/2010/1_5gr.htm
As you can see every loan, bond, or guarantee has to be expressly authorized through relevant laws. Normally this requirement is never a problem, since the government has majority in the parliament and can pass all necessary laws. I am pretty sure the process is very similar in most other democratic countries.
The Icesave agreements were an exception, since in that case the government did not have a clear majority to pass the laws through and was only able to pass it by a very slim margin in Althingi last December after a lot of wrangling.
Bjarni said
“Instead they persisted in making their unreasonable demands, that Iceland pay more than the 20K deposit guarantee, to cover their own costs of guaranteeing deposits over 20K.”
Don’t know why you say that? Surely a reasonable rate is proposed for a loan to cover the guarantee?
“Everyone, including both,UK and Netherlands, as well as Iceland will have to live with the consequences.”
‘Cest la Vie’ – It would seem the Icelandic side is entering the realms of stupidity.
http://www.icenews.is/wp-content/uploads/2010/02/Icelandic_Icesave_negotiation_team_offer_to_UK_and_NL-25_feb_2010.pdf
” Have a look at http://www.bonds.is, you will see that your government sold bonds a few days ago. No vote in parliament on that.”
The central bank can issue state bonds because it has permission by law from parliament, so this has gone trough parliament, as it should.
Laws were created to protect the iterests of the public, not as a tool for politicians to control the public.
This is something the Brown and co dont understand.
To Terry,
Nice seeing you are back…
What I meant by that particular comment is the often mentioned Ragnar Hall issue. This causes half of the recoveries from LBI to be used to cover the UK/Netherlands own guarantee of deposits above 20K which they unilaterally decided to offer. Which then has the unfortunate effect of lowering the amount that is available for Iceland to cover the required EU Directive guarantee below 20K, increasing its costs considerably.
As mentioned here before, this is one of the critical issues behind the opposition to the Icesave agreements among the people in Iceland. The newspaper articles written by Ragnar Hall this summer and then again in the fall, were one of main catalysts for starting the opposition to the agreements. Without this issue, it is very possible that we could have had this whole thing wrapped up a long time ago.
To G. Johnson:
I do not presume to be entitled to speak for what is best for UK/Netherlands. What I am trying to accomplish here with these comments, is explaining in the best way I can, the extraordinary developments that are currently happening in Iceland.
If the governments of UK/Netherlands feel that it is in their best interest to let the referendum go forward, because somehow the people of Iceland are going to have to “come to their senses” afterward, then so be it. But they will have to live with the consequences (as do we), if they are mistaken.
The points you were making about why Iceland cannot afford not taking on this obligation, are all well and good. In fact they are the same arguments our own government have been making for the past 8 months. The only trouble with these points, is that they are NOT accepted by majority of the people in Iceland. And since these laws are going to a referendum, the people of Iceland ARE now the ultimate decision maker on this issue, not the government.
The Icelandic constitution governs everything that our government is allowed to do. It cannot just be turned off, whenever it becomes inconvenient or if someone decides something else is in our best interest. If the referendum goes forward, it will be almost impossible politically to get ANY Icesave agreement accepted in Iceland, no matter how “good” it is. You just need to think of it from the perspective of the political parties, would they be willing to fight for an unpopular agreement against 60-80% of electorate.
That is why I said, “If the UK/Netherlands want to be paid anything from the Icelandic government in addition to the LBI recoveries (6.4B Euros), they should do everything in their power to make sure this does not go to the referendum.”
They even tried to make sure the agreements would be kept secret from both MP’s Althingi and the people.
Not sure that is correct. My recollection (and, given that I forgot what the Ragnar Hall issue was between June and November, you should take that with a pinch of salt :) ) was that they wanted the documents to be examined in the Althingi (by the MPs and associated experts) but not taken out. So kept secret from the people yes, Althingi no.
I see that the NYT/Reuters are saying that there’s some level of talks going on again between the UK and Iceland (no NL). The Icelandic press seemed, via Google translation, to be saying that the UK blinked in the game of chicken and asked the Icelanders to return.
http://www.nytimes.com/reuters/2010/02/27/business/business-us-iceland.html
My comment, http://synonblog.dailymail.co.uk/2010/02/the-clue-is-in-the-bloodline-viking.html
To add to that, i don’t own a flat screen TV or a fancy car…or even a car btw…;)
To Bromley86:
There was a definite effort to keep the agreements secret from even the MP’s. Things are a bit murky exactly when each part of the agreements were shown to the MP´s, but this was clearly an issue in June 2009.
The main source I have for this is a blog entry by Lara Hanna, which is one of the most popular blogger in Iceland (she has been tireless in exposing bad politicians, business people and bankers):
http://larahanna.blog.is/blog/larahanna/entry/900581/
She attended an impromptu meeting with Steingrimur J. the Finance Minister and Indridi H. his deputy and one of the lead negotiators after one of the Saturday protests June 20th 2009.
At this meeting Steingrimur was complaining that it was not the Icelandic government fault that the Icesave agreements were not published, and this was done at the demand of the UK/NL negotiators. He gave her some emails that she then published on her blog.
The first email is from Indridi H. on June 11th (about a week after the agreements were signed):
“The agreement has been discussed in some of the committees of the parliament and THEY HAVE BEEN DEMANDING A COPY OF THE AGREEMENT as well. I think it will be very difficult not to give in to their wishes but we would ask them to keep confidentiality. What is your opinion on that?”
(the emphasis was added by me)
From this it is very clear that even a week after the agreements were signed, the MP´s were still demanding to see the actual agreements.
The answer from the British negotiator comes back same day:
“What I tend to do is to invite people to read the documents in a room but do not let them make copies. It means they will be able to tell people the content but the documents themselves are not circulated to the world. Would that work in Iceland? ”
The Dutch negotiator answer the day after on June 12th:
“If the suggestion of G(British) works, than I have no objections to it. My slight worry of making everything public, is that this MAY CAUSE LOT OF OUTSIDE-COMMENT THAT WILL MAKE THE DISCUSSION EVEN MORE COMPLICATED. If however you really feel that your only possibility lies in making the arrangements public, I would be ready to consider that. What should be clear, is that we cannot renegotiate.”
(The emphases was added by me)
The Dutch negotiator ended up being right, it did indeed cause a LOT of outside comments :-)
Lara Hanna goes on later in her blog to say that the Dutch version of the agreements were leaked to the press between 12th and 17th of June.
The settlement agreement that contains 4.2(b) [the Ragnar Hall issue] was kept secret much longer. It was not until July 28th, that it was leaked, which was actually done by Gunnar Tómasson, former IMF economist, which has sometimes participated in the discussion here on Icenews.is.
http://www.vald.org/greinar/090728.html
All these unnecessary efforts to keep the agreements secrets did cause a lot of distrust, poisoned the atmosphere, and definitely damaged the chances of agreements being accepted by the Icelandic people.
To Bromley86:
Just to remind everyone, this is NOT a game. This matter and how it is resolved, concerns the whole economic future of our country.
If the UK negotiators are willing to start discussions again, this is a positive thing, so long as it produces acceptable results this time around. Apparently, the reason the earlier discussions broke down, was that the UK/NL negotiators were not “authorized” to review or discuss the Icelandic proposal.
“the UK blinked in the game of chicken and asked the Icelanders to return.”
In light of recent news; I will reffer to a post I made on friday night:
“Because now there is something for sure, IF Iceland pays its going to be under it´s terms and conditions. And that is IF Iceland pays.”
Einhver einhverstaðar says … i don’t own … a fancy car.
… so the mystery of the Icelandic economic collapse remains a mystery …
http://www.pressan.is/Frettir/LesaFrett/bilainnflutningur-gaeti-glaedst-med-vorinu-luxuskerrurnar-bida-ekki-lengur-i-rodum
Iceland’s favorite head of state appears in this clip “De Val van Balkenende” below..best adaptation of Hitler Bunker scene yet..
How effortlessly actual Balkenende quotes flow from Hitler’s mouth “What is needed is strength! not the easy way out!’…not to mention the uncanny physical resemblence when Hitler wears glasses..
In an eerily similar storyline to the original 3rd Reich version…
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BwXh3aAF0Nw
Easy says:
“Because now there is something for sure, IF Iceland pays its going to be under it´s terms and conditions. And that is IF Iceland pays.”
I agree, Iceland should refuse to pay the debt. UK/NL can wait for 30 years until Iceland’s economy recovers from default and then claim the debt with interest. Iceland will be ****ed for the next thirty years and will pay all its other creditors back, but the debt won’t go away and your grandchildren will still pay for it. Iceland’s choice is whether to pay the debt or be harassed politically and crippled financially until it pays the debt back.
DONT PAY A PENNY ICELAND!! STUPID, GREEDY UK LOCAL GOVERNMENT FINANCE OFFICERS PUT THEIR RATEPAYERS MONEY OFFSHORE!!! ER…..
WHICH OTHER COUNTRY WOULD ALLOW THAT MADNESS. THIS COMES FROM A UK GOVERNMENT WHICH SOLD ALL IT’S GOLD RESERVES….FOR $200 AN OUNCE!! AND NEVER SUPERVISED NORTHERN ROCK FOR 5 YEARS. PAY THEM WITH A FEW COD HEADS…