Yesterday I visited the White House with the Congressional Black Caucus and raised an issue with the president which I don't believe has gotten much attention.
You may find this hard to believe, but with all of the high profile efforts to defeat global poverty [1], there are actually investors out there who hijack debt relief arrangements [2] between donor and debtor nations so they can sue the debtor nations and collect a huge profit.
These investors create so-called "vulture funds" and prey upon poor, African countries so laden with debt they are unable to invest in their own futures. For these countries, the debt relief arrangements they reach with donor nations give them the only real shot to fight the poverty, hunger and disease afflicting their inhabitants.
These suits against debtor nations are often filed by the "vulture funds" in U.S. courts. I believe this is something we must fight. We should not stand idly by while these vultures rob poor, African nations the opportunity to rise up out of poverty and despair.
I expressed this yesterday with the president and spoke about this with Amy Goodman on Democracy Now this morning [3].
Links:
[1] http://www.one.org/
[2] http://gregpalast.com/
[3] http://www.democracynow.org/article.pl?sid=07/02/16/1548232