DUSHANBE, August 3, 2015, Asia-Plus — Tajikistan is planning to completely pay off its debt to Uzbekistan until the end of this year, according to the Ministry of Finance (MoF).
An official source at a MoF says Tajikistan’s debt to Uzbekistan has declined from 8.03 million U.S. dollars (USD) to 2.99 million USD over the first half of this year.
“Tajikistan is planning to completely pay off its debt to Uzbekistan until the end of this year,” the source said.
According to him, Tajikistan is also expected to completely pay off its US$610,000 to Kazakhstan until the end of this year.
The country’s foreign debt has reportedly declined 34.6 million U.S. dollars (USD) to 2.1 billion USD over the first six months of this year.
First Deputy Minister of Finance, Jamshed Karimzoda, told reporters in Dushanbe on July 24 that Tajikistan’s foreign debt is now equal to 19.5 percent of the country’s gross domestic product (GDP).
China reportedly remains Tajikistan’s largest creditor – 942 million USD. Tajikistan now also owes 312.6 million USD to the World Bank, 262.5 million USD to the Asian Development Bank and 110.2 million to the Islamic Development Bank.
We will recall that in a report released at a news conference in Dushanbe, Lochin Fayzulloyev, First Deputy Chairman of the State Committee for Investments and State-owned Property Management (GosKomInvest), revealed on July 27 that Tajikistan is revising its external borrowing policy.
“Under the country’s new financial policy, Tajikistan’s foreign debt should not exceed 40 percent of the country’s gross domestic product in the future,” Fayzulloyev said.
“Under the new strategy foreign debt management strategy, Tajikistan will borrow money only in the event if the interest rate does not exceed 2 percent and the grace period is 12 years,” Tajik official said.
