We see the Jubilee in the Year 2000 as the time for a new beginning for impoverished nations, an opportunity for justice and the solution to the problem of international debt. It is not only the approach of the Third Millennium that makes this a time ripe for change. Within the last decade, old animosities between East and West have broken down and new, stronger, and wider allegiances between rich nations have developed. The time is right to rectify relations between North and South. Shared economic growth, fairer trading links, increasingly stable political relationships, sustaining the environmentC these goals benefit North and South.
Development is an expression of the common good.
The international debt remains a serious obstacle to human development. Many impoverished countries are forced to use their scarce resources, including bilateral aid, to pay their creditors rather than to invest in the health and education of their people. However, through continuous pressure and long-term commitment, civil society organizations and some concerned governments have attempted to reduce the debt of the world's poorest countries. These have made a helpful, yet marginal difference in the lives of people. In 1996, another possibility for debt relief emerged.