The Prime Minister returned from the United Kingdom today after a 10-day semi-official visit. He met with Queen Elizabeth, Prince Charles, state and municipal officials as well as executives from Tate and Lyle who import sugar from BSI. But what the official itinerary didn't say is that he also met with the Ashcroft Alliance. In fact, there were reports in the opposition press that Ashcroft bankrolled the whole trip. The PM laughed at that one, but conceded that there were meetings held:…
Jules Vasquez
"That perhaps the invisible hand, the moving hand of the Ashcroft alliance had been somehow involved in your goings on in the UK, is that true?"
Hon. Dean Barrow - Prime Minister of Belize
"Absolutely not, had nothing to do with the trip"
Jules Vasquez
"Did you have any meeting with Aschroft or any of it's functionaries?"
Hon. Dean Barrow
"Well I may have taken the opportunity to discuss where things are with the various court cases and the various bits of litigation but, no man, this was a trip paid for by the Government and people of Belize and some aspects of the hospitality was paid for by the British Government, absolutely nothing to do with Michael Ashcroft in terms of any kind of bank rolling of any part of the visit."
Jules Vasquez
"But are there active talks about some rapprochement being reached with the Ashcroft alliance, particularly in view of the fact that now apparently Belize will have to go to International arbitration over the $22.5USD million dollar loan."
Hon. Dean Barrow
"I don't think that you could ever talk about a rapprochement. There is clearly going to be a point at which when litigation comes to an end, depending on the results on the litigation - Belize may have to make some payments. There is, as you know, a window that allows us to issue some additional funds for up to I think 70 million US under Super Bond 2 and if ultimately there are going to be awards that we will have to satisfy, it is always useful to see how we might be able to take advantage of the fairly favorable terms that we have by way of super bond 2. So that would be the extent of the discussions but of course I and the government must decide whether the point of no return has been reached with respect to some of the awards that have already been made or whether we can continue to fight on."
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