International commission calls for permanent debt‑restructuring mechanism and higher aid in new financing report

Jose Antonio Ocampo, chair of the International Commission of Experts on Financing for Development and professor of professional practice in international and public affairs at Columbia University, told the UN Correspondents Association that the commission’s report, Financing a Sustainable Future: Proposals for a Renewed Global Development Finance Agenda, recommends a permanent mechanism to negotiate sovereign debt and a short‑term improvement to existing restructuring processes.

“...we must have a much better mechanism for the renegotiations, in the short term,” Ocampo said, adding that such a permanent mechanism could be set up as either a United Nations institution or “in the IMF” provided its decisions would be independent of the IMF board.

The report, prepared by 14 experts convened at Spain’s initiative and scheduled for public release tomorrow, addresses nine broad topics: tax cooperation, development cooperation, the role of multilateral and national development banks and domestic bond markets, official development…