DUSHANBE, January 10, 2009, Asia-Plus  -- As of January 1, 2009, Tajikistan’s external debt has amounted to 1.366 billion US dollars, Finance Minister Safarali Najmuddinov announced at an enlarged meeting of the Ministry of Economic Development and Trade (MoEDT) in Dushanbe on January 9.

According to him, 308 million US dollars went last year to servicing the country’s foreign debt.  “Of this amount; $250 million have been spent to pay principal and $58 million have been used to pay foreign debt interest,” the minister said.

Najmuddinov assessed the fact that the external debt is estimated at 28.8 percent of the country’s gross domestic product (GDP) as satisfactory, because “there are countries whose external debt is estimated at up to 60 percent of GDP.”

We will recall that as of January 1, 2008, Tajikistan’s foreign debt had amounted to 1.119 billion US dollars.