Goodbye USSR!

Alexey Kudrin repaid old debts

Last year, Russia parted with the debt legacy of the USSR , paying more than $23 billion to the Paris Club creditor countries. For Russia, there is no longer a debt problem. Its external debt now amounts to less than 5% of GDP.

Early repayment of debts became possible solely due to rising energy prices, which was truly a gift for a country that had struggled to make ends meet throughout the 90s. Then there was nothing to pay off debts in the context of the collapse of the economy and a chronically deficit budget.

By the time of the default in August 1998, Soviet debt had been restructured four times. In 1999, the G8 leaders at the Cologne summit promised to “assist” the Paris Club to take up the problem of the Soviet debt “with a view to its comprehensive solution at a later stage, when conditions have been created in Russia to allow the implementation of a program of deeper economic reforms.” . But if by 1999 Russia was able to agree partly on writing off and partly on deferring payments on debts to private creditors (the London Club), it was not possible to do this with creditor countries. Since the beginning of the 2000s, due to changes in foreign economic conditions, the situation began to change fundamentally. Moscow's attempt in early 2001 to stop paying the Paris Club caused a scandal.

But, not having had time to solve the “2003 problem” without problems, Russia began completely different negotiations - on the early repayment of the Soviet debt. They walked long and hard. Germany, the main holder of the debt, could not accept the loss of interest over the next few years and demanded payment of a “premium”. In 2005, the Paris Club agreed to receive $15 billion ahead of schedule.

In June of this year, at negotiations in Paris, it was possible to agree on a scheme for the early settlement of all remaining debt - $22 billion. Russia even agreed to pay creditors a bonus of $1 billion for the fact that, by accepting money ahead of schedule, they would lose in the future on interest payments. Already at the last stage, an unexpected obstacle arose in the White House: Mikhail Fradkov was surprised that the scheme was agreed upon at the negotiations in Paris, but not agreed upon with him. So, Alexei Kudrin, who persuaded the obstinate Germans, had to additionally persuade his own boss. At the same time, the additional payment of $1 billion cannot be compared with the savings that Russia will receive by paying off its debts ahead of schedule. According to the Ministry of Finance, the total savings from the federal budget on interest payments to the Paris Club of creditors for the period until 2020 will exceed $12 billion.

Anna GORSHKOVA, Anna LANDER, Natalya ROMANOVA, Mikhail VOROBIEV, Nikolay GORELOV, Alexey GRIVACH, Andrey DENI