In an interview with the Guardian, one of the leading newspapers in the United Kingdom, Ayhan Köse, Deputy Chief Economist at the World Bank, stated that they "expect the Beijing administration to act more actively".
Pointing out that China has become an important country in terms of the loans it has provided in the last 15 years, Köse stated that it should take responsibility for post-pandemic debt relief initiatives.
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Köse, Director of the World Bank's Development Prospects Group, said, "China is a major player and critical in debt relief."
In the International Debt Report published by the Bank in December, it was reported that poor countries paid a record public debt of 88.9 billion dollars in 2022 with the rise in global interest rates.
In the report, it was stated that about 60 percent of low-income countries face or are already at risk of high debt distress.
Pointing out that the problems faced by these countries are not brought to the agenda as much as they should be, Köse described the situation in question as a "silent crisis".
Köse pointed out that poor countries, which make up about 16 percent of the world's population, cannot borrow in global financial markets or postpone their existing debts:
So what will they do in this situation? They will have to cut education and health expenditures and they will regress. These are actually the opposite of the steps we want them to take. It makes things worse and makes the crisis permanent.
