European Parliament calls for sanctions against Argentina

[dipsydoodle]

The European Parliament passed a resolution condemning Argentina’s nationalisation of YPF and called for a partial suspension of tariffs that benefit exports from the South American country to the EU.

Spain also took unilateral action on Friday to retaliate for Argentina's expropriation of Repsol's controlling stake in the energy company YPF, announcing plans to curtail its imports of Argentine biodiesels.

As the diplomatic row over the nationalisation escalated, European MEPs voted to "deplore" Buenos Aires' "unilateral and arbitrary" decision. They urged the European Commission to consider a partial suspension of preferential tariffs that benefit Argentine exports to the EU.

Argentina had failed to follow its "obligations stemming from international agreements" and the EC should seek to use all tools available at the World Trade Organisation and G20 to respond, the MEPs said.

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/finance/newsbysector/energy/oilandgas/9216541/European-Parliament-calls-for-sanctions-against-Argentina.html

[FreakinDJ]

1. Didn't the Banksters already completely RAID Argentina’s wealth

Stole the Social Security Funds after Argentina Privatized Social Security and generally Bankrupted the entire country

I guess trying to dig yourself out of a very deep hole is forbidden in the Bankster Driven World Economy

[dipsydoodle]

2. The point is

that Argentina was paid when they privatised part of their oil industry and now they want it back without paying.There's no point in them being taken to an international court - they never cough up. It was inevitable that Spain which is their second largest export customer would involve the EU which is what has happened now albeit sooner that I would have thought. It will become swings and roundabouts for Argentina but its their choice - they'll gain on the oil side but screw their farm industry etc.

[FreakinDJ]

3. Thats only one side of the story - The Bankster's

all of these Bankruptcy take overs that have been occuring in Argentina since the collapse of their economy (driven by the greedy Banksters) has been thoroughly vetted by the Courts of Argentina

If they didn't like the Laws of Argentina then they shouldn't have signed on the dotted line

[ocpagu]

4. "The point is that Argentina was paid when they privatised part of their oil industry"

I admit I have to research more about the background of YPF privatization, but considering the general context of privatizations in Latin America, I wouldn't be so sure about that...

There are some dozens of cases of public companies in Latin America that were literally donated to private hands...

Brazil's Vale do Rio Doce was sold for U$ 3 billion, while its patrimony was estimated in, at least, U$ 120 billion. Its private owners recovered the investment made in the purchase in a week...

Another good example from Brazil: Eletropaulo, a power distributor.

Imagine that you have a car and you want to sell it. You offer it to a friend of yours, but he says he doesn't have money to pay for it. What do you do? You lend him money to buy YOUR car. Your friend never pays the money he borrowed. And you end up without your car and without your money. Stupid, isn't it? That's exactly what happened to MANY Latin American companies privatized in the 1990s, including Eletropaulo.

Eletropaulo was sold to the American company AES - which was about to declare bankruptcy in its homeland. AES didn't have money to buy it. So a Brazilian public bank named BNDES granted AES a loan to grant the purchasing. The loan was never paid. Brazil literally PAID to privatize Eletropaulo.

[dipsydoodle]

5. Argentinian president, Cristina Fernández de Kirchner, rejects criticism over YPF nationalisation

He launches finger-wagging attacks on the "free-market fundamentalists" whom he accuses of conspiring against Argentina's economic independence. Opposition journalists he dismisses as "parrots" in the pay of corporations that want to destroy the self-defined "national and popular" government of which he is a proud member.

Axel Kicillof, the country's baby-faced deputy economy minister, is the mastermind behind the controversial seizure last week by Cristina Fernández de Kirchner, Argentina's president, of the oil giant YPF, the largest company in Argentina, without paying prior compensation to its Spanish owner, Repsol.

Reaction was strong around the world. For Spain, in the middle of an economic crisis, the loss of Repsol's lucrative Argentinian arm was a blow. In the US, the Wall Street Journal described the surprise move as "theft".

Hillary Clinton, the US secretary of state, Mariano Rajoy, Spain's prime minister, and Felipe Calderón, Mexico's president, labelled the seizure as "unjustifiable" and "a mistake". But Kirchner – reportedly "hypnotised" by 41-year-old Kicillof's interventionist economic ideas – is not about to lose sleep over international opinion

http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2012/apr/22/argentina-president-ypf-nationalisation