With its shuttered banks, furious public protests and iconoclastic politicians, the plight of Greece, brought to its knees by a crippling debt burden, has been gripping and heartbreaking in equal measure: a full-blown sovereign debt crisis on the doorstep of some of the wealthiest countries in the world.
Yet new analysis by the Jubilee Debt Campaign reveals that Greece’s plight is far from unique: more than 20 other countries are also wrestling with their own debt crises.
Many more, from Senegal to Laos, lie in a debt danger zone, where an economic downturn or a sudden jump in interest rates on world debt markets could lead to disaster.
Jubilee’s analysis defines countries as at high risk of a government debt crisis if they have net debt higher than 30% of GDP, a current-account deficit of over 5% of GDP and future debt repayments worth more than 10% of government revenue.
On the list of countries currently in government debt crisis are Armenia, Ukraine, Cyprus, Ireland, Spain, Portugal, Montenegro, Lebanon, Macedonia, Croatia, Tunisia, and some others.
Source: Panorama.am