ECONOMIC POLICY : RECORD FINANCIAL ASSISTANCE FOR LATVIA.

Following on from Hungary, Latvia will soon be receiving financial assistance from the EU - and other international organisations - to help correct its economic imbalances, heightened by the financial crisis. The European Commission, giving effect to a joint commitment made on 19 December (see Europolitics 3664), formally proposed, on 8 January, a financial assistance package of 3.1 billion for Latvia under the medium-term balance of payments financial assistance mechanism(1) The Ecofin Council will be voting on the aid at its meeting, on 20 January.

The country will receive record financial aid of 7.5 billion, with the remainder coming from the International Monetary Fund (1.7 bn), the Nordic countries (1.8 bn), the European Bank for Reconstruction and Development and the Eastern European countries (0.5 bn) and the World Bank (0.4 bn). It will be granted in six instalments over a two-year period, up to the first quarter of 2011.

The financial assistance will be...