We have to react quickly to send the message that Iceland does intend to honour its commitments. This is not a comfortable position for us. The government of the Independence Party and the Social Democrats agreed on negotiations with the UK and the Netherlands in 2008. This makes our nation look bad on the outside. The economic indications [...]

  BBC Europe business reporter Nigel Cassidy said it was an astonishing decision. “It really plunges Iceland into a constitutional crisis,” he said. He pointed out that Iceland is having to borrow the $5bn needed for the compensation. “They don’t have the money,” he said. “They are having to borrow it from the IMF to [...]

The political farce continues. The president of Iceland has just put his own personal gain above the interest of his nation. He has asked for a national referendum on the IceSave bill. What is the nation going to vote on? To pay or not to pay? If I were asked if I preferred to pay [...]

Channel 4′s story about IceSave. “The Icelandic economy, the state being debt-less, this would not be too much for the state to swallow”. – David Oddson

He has to approve the IceSave bill. It is easy to justify it. Vigdis Finnbogadottir made a tough decision seventeen years ago when she went against her own conviction and her own political interest and approved the EES agreement. She justified it by saying that she had made the decision for future generations, not herself. [...]

A local council in a rural area north by the sea began a discussion about a farmland which had been left by the farmer last autumn. The land was in bad shape and something needed to be done. A lot of discussion went on but little was done. This land had been owned by the [...]

Bjorgolfur Thor was handed Landsbankinn through privatization because he was supposed to have made a mint abroad and re-investing it in the Icelandic economy was seen as a positive move. Landsbankinn’s bankruptcy within six years then turned out to be one of the biggest in history. Not just in Iceland but anywhere. The bank’s IceSave [...]

Of course nobody in Iceland WANTS to pay the IceSave debt accumulated by Landsbankinn. Neither do we WANT to pay the cost of the Central Bank bankrupted by the Independence Party. But those organizing “national votes” or petitions denying responsibility appear utterly silly. The debt won’t go away just by saying no, we don’t WANT [...]

It is really nice to see the support the InDefence group has received in its fight against the IceSave agreement as this screen  shot from their website where Icelanders are urged to sign a petition for the president to veto the bill once it is out of Althingi. Icelanders are especially touched by Brad Pitt taking [...]

It is hard to understand why members of parliament and the government are outraged when the state is supposed to pay unfair debts. When they are simultaneously adamant that the state’s citizens should pay up their unfair debts fully and completely.