WASHINGTON, September 12. /TASS/. The International Monetary Fund (IMF) has "nothing to add" to what has been already said about the upcoming discussion of the Ukrainian program at the IMF Board of Directors on Wednesday, the press service of the Fund told TASS on Monday, commenting on the statements of Russian Finance Minister Anton Siluanov.
In particular, at a briefing in Moscow Siluanov said that Russia would vote against granting Ukraine the new IMF loan tranche.
In early September, the IMF spokesman Gerry Rice said at a press briefing that the next review of the Ukrainian program will be completed at the meeting.
Initially, the loan funds to support the program were planned in tranches of $1.7 bln. Recently, however, the authorities in Kiev talked about receiving around $1 bln. According to Rice, the volume of the tranche will be discussed at the meeting with the Board of Directors. The IMF program for Ukraine is being implemented despite the fact that Kiev has a sovereign debt to Russia. More recently, it is not prohibited by the rules of the Fund, but the same rules require the debtor to negotiate in good faith with the lender.
Finance Minister Anton Siluanov told reporters earlier that the IMF is likely to take a positive decision on granting the next tranche to Ukraine but Russia views it as a biased decision.
In December 2013, the presidents of Russia and Ukraine, Vladimir Putin and Viktor Yanukovich, agreed that Moscow would issue a $15-billion credit to Kiev by offering Ukrainian securities. Under the program, bonds worth $3 billion were placed at the Irish Stock Exchange on December 20, 2013. Russia repurchased them by using the money from the National Welfare Fund.
Ukraine’s previous government set a moratorium on the payment of the state debt to Russia on December 18, 2015. The then Ukrainian Prime Minister Arseniy Yatsenyuk explained that the move had been prompted by Russia’s refusal to strike a debt restructuring deal with Ukraine on a par with private creditors.