Moreover, Gordon Brown already bailed the savers out. Then he uses gunboat diplomacy to bring a country to heel. His coercive foreign policy of bullying a smaller country is positively American.

So, sorry if I went off line.

The articles I presented as background were both current and a comprehensive spectrum of views on the issue from the past day before I published this post. The fact that I scan news from different countries gives my readers a better perspective of what’s happening.

Moreover, I am very sympathetic to what the Icelandic President did – and therefore to the opinion you, as an Icelander, pose. Why else would I write the title as “heeds 70% of the electorate on Icesave debt.”

I don’t know what you’re reading into the post but you really should re-read it, especially what Hudson says to end the post

At stake, therefore, is how much can be paid without wrecking Iceland’s economy. How many Icelanders must lose their homes as carrying charges soar on mortgages indexed to the exchange rate? Emigration is accelerating, and many foreign workers already have left. How many more must depart? And if the post-Soviet experience of a steep and sudden drop in living standards is relevant, by how many years must Icelandic lifespans shorten?

1. The Icesave issue is not about who is paying or not. It is about the terms UK and Holland are forcing on Iceland in case the bank in question does not have enough assets to repay the depositors.
2. On October 2008 the Icelandic Parliament passed an emergency law changing the priority of claims in case of bank going burst. Prior to that deposits were regular claims but their status was changed to priority claims. This basically means that a bank must be in very bad situation not to be able to repay the deposits or at least the minimum payment the EU directive requires.
3. The Icelandic Depositors Guarantee Fund (IDGF) will cover up to EUR 20,887 if the banks assets are insufficient. That would be very unlikely if it had not been that the UK and Dutch governments bullied Iceland to accept that depositor’s claims above EUR 20,887 would have the same priority as claims below that figure. This basically means that if you had 35,000 euro on account and the bank’s assets could cover up to 30,000 the Dutch/UK guarantee fund would get everything back, but the IDGF would have to cash out 5,000 euros! The reason is that for every euro the IDGF gets repaid, the other two get also 1 euro (combined). But of course it should be the Dutch/UK guarantee fund that should loose 5,000 euros.
4. The Icelandic parliament passed a law in September that approved the repayment scheme with conditions. The UK and Dutch governments only had to accept these conditions, but they were like schoolyard bullies that were not happy with getting this week’s pocket money but also wanted next week’s.

The situation is very strange. Two big countries are bullying a small country for a cash that a bank is paying. These two countries without asking paid depositors up to 50,000 pound and 100,000 euros an now they want their money back by their terms. It is ridiculous that because they paid more than required that they get the same priority to the money to cover their extra expenditure as the IDGF gets to cover the minimum guarantee.

Iceland is by no mean trying to get easily off. We just want a fair and just solution so we can get on with the rebuilding of the economy after some irresponsible bankers had a party that ended badly.

Yes, go read their own SEC paperwork.

Without paying themselves such piggish bonuses, they would have turned a profit of $4B for the past 2 years.

We should not pay anything until the bankers and their families are squeezed dry for everything they stole and then thrown into forced labor camps.