The Icelandic authorities have been given an extended deadline to respond to a letter from the EFTA concerning the Icesave dispute.
ESA, the EFTA Surveillance Authority, sent a letter in May detailing that it feels the Icelandic government must pay the Netherlands and the United Kingdom back the minimum contractual amount for the money the two countries spent in compensating customers of the failed Icesave internet bank, run by Iceland’s Landsbanki.
RUV reports that the Icelandic government was given two months to respond to the letter or face possible expulsion from the European Free Trade Association. The original deadline was next Monday, but has now been extended to the beginning of September – possibly because of ongoing negotiations between the three countries involved.
Iceland has always expressed its intention to pay, but the EFTA wants to know when.
>” RUV reports that the Icelandic government was given two months to respond to the letter. The original deadline was next Monday, but has now been extended to the beginning of September. ”
As usual our useless Red-Green government has been sitting in its seats drinking double mocchino latte and and not getting experts to work through the issues.
They have been less than worth less for some time — actively ignoring the important things just to work on EU application in complete definance of wishes of people and particularly tax taxpayers of Iceland.
http://www.icenews.is/index.php/2010/07/06/icelandic-krona-appears-to-be-doing-well/#comment-200421
http://www.icenews.is/index.php/2010/07/02/icelanders-in-the-dark-over-eu-pros-and-cons/#comment-196959
http://www.icenews.is/index.php/2010/07/15/iceland-eligible-for-eu-funding/#comment-207188
>”or face possible expulsion from the European Free Trade Association. ”
What nonsense.
The EFTA Suivellance authority ( equivalent to EU commission ) and EFTA court ( diret equivalent to EU Courts of Justice ) have not even hinted that this is a possibility, and it is simply not in either of their powers as delegated under EEA agreement from the states ( Iceland, Liechtenstein, Norway ).
http://www.eftasurv.int/media/annual-reports/Introdocution2009.pdf
http://www.eftacourt.int/index.php/court/mission/introduction/
The evulation letter of 26 May 2010 by Kurt Jaeger representing the College of EFTA Survellance Authority makes it clear that then this goes into EFTA Court machinery.
But as we can see that is not in interest of UK or Holland on IceSave matter and so there is the extension to avoid it.
This opinion by Mr Jäger reads not as clear cut as many not rehersed in what happens next and facts of case might think. What matters is EFTA Court ruling which gives all aspects of case fair hearing.
( No EU ” kangeroo court ” arbitration here. So thank you to Mr Jäger for getting ball rolling. )
http://www.icenews.is/index.php/2010/05/27/efta-iceland-must-pay-icesave/#comment-170782
http://www.icenews.is/index.php/2010/05/27/efta-iceland-must-pay-icesave/#comment-185897
As to personalites involved Kurt Jäger was replaced on EFTA Survelliance Authority College by Sabine Monauni-Tömördy on 1st July.
( Mr Jäger has now been appointed as Liechtenstein’s new ambassador to EU and Belgium, based in Brussels. Congratulations to Mr Jäger on his new appointment. )
As Bjarni did exaplain :
http://www.icenews.is/index.php/2010/05/27/efta-iceland-must-pay-icesave/#comment-171198
” > if Icesave agreement is not reached, this effectively precludes the Icelandic government from taking on a lot of new debt. In addition to the Icesave debt itself, further Nordic/IMF loans will not be made available (we go “cold turkey”). ”
” UK and Netherlands will ALWAYS get the original 4B Euros back from Landsbanki bankruptcy proceedings over the next 10 years (in fact the recovery is likely to be closer to 6B Euros). So they will always get paid. …
[ But ] There is one big potential exception to the above mentioned ‘ALWAYS’ that has not been discussed much yet in the press.
If the current lawsuit [ in Reykjavík court ] by the other major claimants of Landsbanki [ ie bond holders ] succeeds, then [ UK and Dutch governments ] will get about 2/3 of the bankruptcy recoveries instead of nothing. [ Bond holder's ] claim is that the [ Icelandic ] emergency laws from October 2008 violated their rights by giving the depositors priority of other claimants.
This would then subsequently mean that UK/NL governments will get only 1/3 of their claims, instead of the full 4B Euros, resulting in direct losses of about 2.6B Euros. Needless to say, they would probably not be too happy with this outcome. “
Meant to say :
* [ bond holders ] will get about 2/3 of the bankruptcy recoveries instead of nothing.
@Fisy,
Foreign currency loans have been declared illegal. This is also likely to have impact on the recovery rate from the (old) Landsbanki assets isn’t it?
Niels :
>Foreign currency loans have been declared illegal. This is also likely to have impact on the recovery rate from the (old) Landsbanki assets isn’t it?
Although we haven’t hard any good explanations+ what it means as to implications, it seems that the banks already do have right downs 50% expected from this loans factored in and this does not radically effect that projection.
+http://www.icenews.is/index.php/2010/06/19/foreign-currency-car-loans-confirmed-as-illegal-in-iceland/#comment-200433
Iceland refuses to pay back guranteed bank bonds!
Wow – guarantees only work until banks go bankrupt.
No rules in Iceland., kick them out of the EU union.
The IMF must be very patient with Iceland, because they do not seem to obey any form of international law.
My proof – check bonds for research:
XS0308636157 – Kaupthing
XS0244143961 – Landsbanki
>Iceland refuses to pay back guranteed bank bonds!
But were those bonds state guaranteed, or were they guaranteed by the insolvent old banks?
European banks are pyramid schemes.
The man in the street saves his hard earned money through sewat and blood, while the bank executives steal it all through huge salaries and bonusses.
What do you do if a Bank steals your money? Rob the bank.
A work colleague once told me, money in a bank is not a good investment and should be temporary solution, a little too late,
may life savings are gone.
>A work colleague once told me, money in a bank is not a good investment and should be temporary solution
Actually, he was advocating putting that money into riskier enterprises, like shares. If the company collapses with shares then you might reasonably expect to get nearly nothing back, whereas you are presumably looking at an eventual recovery rate of 70-90%.
WOW! It seems that EFTA is trying to get rid of the poor icelandic little brother! yeah, and they don’t even know how to say it more clearly.. at least they are polite in asking Iceland to just “leave”…
Please Miss Norway, show Iceland the way to the front door.. I bet has to leave the club soon… No, wait Miss Switzerland, it is better if she goes out at the back of the house, using the service door…
Really Gus.
The EFTA Suivellance authority ( equivalent to EU commission ) and EFTA court ( diret equivalent to EU Courts of Justice ) have not even hinted that this is a possibility [ expulsion ], and it is simply not in either of their powers as delegated under EEA agreement from the states ( Iceland, Liechtenstein, Norway ).
Otherwise Switzerland ( EFTA member but not in EEA with trade agreements separately negotiated parallel to EEA ) would already have been ” kicked out ” of EFTA.
Apparently they have hinted at the possibility:
The Icelandic government has two months to respond formally to the letter. If Iceland does not respond appropriately, the letter could be the first step in removing Iceland from the EEA.
http://www.icenews.is/index.php/2010/05/27/efta-iceland-must-pay-icesave/
” the letter could be the first step in removing Iceland from the EEA. ”
As I think that there was a posting delay between my one and Brumley’s post, I just want to make clear for readers of this thread that this was not stated by the EFTA Surviellance Authority or any other jurist with any knowledge of hte treaties.
It simply is not in the powers of EFTA treaty or agreement that did make the EEA for a ruling of EFTA Court to make this happen.
At most the powers is to allow a fine against the member state ( and of course the humilaition of a ruling against for the EFTA state involved ).
Two important threads about this subject :
http://www.icenews.is/index.php/2011/04/01/uk-and-dutch-councils-to-be-priority-claims-on-old-icelandic-banks/#comment-548702
http://www.icenews.is/index.php/2011/04/12/uk-netherlands-taxpayers-will-still-get-icesave-cash-back-after-iceland-no-vote/#comment-550518