{"id":65045,"date":"2013-02-11T10:30:49","date_gmt":"2013-02-11T08:30:49","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.turkishnews.com\/en\/content\/?p=65045"},"modified":"2013-10-19T21:25:26","modified_gmt":"2013-10-19T18:25:26","slug":"turkey-to-clear-imf-debt-by-may","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.turkishnews.com\/en\/content\/2013\/02\/11\/turkey-to-clear-imf-debt-by-may\/","title":{"rendered":"Turkey to clear IMF debt by May"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><span class=\"removed_link\" title=\"https:\/\/www.turkishnews.com\/en\/content\/?attachment_id=65046\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"alignright size-full wp-image-65046\" alt=\"6\" src=\"https:\/\/www.turkishnews.com\/en\/content\/wp-content\/uploads\/2013\/02\/6.jpg\" width=\"80\" height=\"80\" \/><\/span>ISTANBUL (AFP) &#8211; Turkey is set to make a &#8220;clean break&#8221; with the International Monetary Fund by paying off its remaining debt by May, Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan said on Saturday.<\/p>\n<p>&#8220;We have been paying and paying&#8230; Right now the debt stands at $860 million (643 million euros),&#8221; Erdogan said in televised remarks.<\/p>\n<p>&#8220;When we pay the last slice in May, we will zero out the debt and make a clean break,&#8221; he added.<\/p>\n<p>Erdogan said his Islamic-rooted Justice and Development Party (AKP) government, which took over a $23.5 billion IMF debt when it came to power in 2002, was in talks to loan five billion dollars to the the global institution.<\/p>\n<p>The pay-off would mean a &#8220;new era&#8221; for Turkey where taxes can be put toward expanding national infrastructure once the debt is cleared, Finance Minister Mehmet Simsek was quoted as saying by Anatolia news agency.<\/p>\n<p>&#8220;We have somehow maintained a debt deal (with the IMF) since 1958,&#8221; he said. &#8220;Turkey is now entering a new era by not signing into any programs and clearing its debt completely&#8230;Turkey will be climbing up the ladder in a sense.&#8221;<\/p>\n<p>Over the decades, Turkish governments have signed 19 stand-by agreements with the fund for over $50 billion to meet financial challenges.<\/p>\n<p>In 2008, Ankara managed to complete its last stand-by with the IMF, signed in 2005, and refused its aid in 2010, following two years of negotiation with the Washington-based institution.<\/p>\n<p>During that period, the Turkish economy staged a spectacular recovery despite the global financial crisis, growing by 8.9 percent in 2010 and by 8.5 percent in 2011.<\/p>\n<p>Its growth has however slowed down significantly since late 2011, with government forecasting a growth of five percent each for 2014 and 2015 amid its plans for a &#8220;soft landing.&#8221;<\/p>\n<p>via Turkey to clear IMF debt by May: Erdogan &#8211; The West Australian.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>ISTANBUL (AFP) &#8211; Turkey is set to make a &#8220;clean break&#8221; with the International Monetary Fund by paying off its remaining debt by May, Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan said on Saturday. &#8220;We have been paying and paying&#8230; Right now the debt stands at $860 million (643 million euros),&#8221; Erdogan said in televised remarks. &#8220;When [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":83,"featured_media":65046,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[89],"tags":[995],"class_list":["post-65045","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-turkey","tag-imf"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.turkishnews.com\/en\/content\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/65045","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.turkishnews.com\/en\/content\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.turkishnews.com\/en\/content\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.turkishnews.com\/en\/content\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/83"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.turkishnews.com\/en\/content\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=65045"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.turkishnews.com\/en\/content\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/65045\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.turkishnews.com\/en\/content\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/65046"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.turkishnews.com\/en\/content\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=65045"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.turkishnews.com\/en\/content\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=65045"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.turkishnews.com\/en\/content\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=65045"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}