Stanford investors seek to block Antigua's IMF loan

 

Antigua and Barbuda has been a target for Stanford investors ever since the disgraced former billionaire was charged with fraud.

WASHINGTON, United States, October 26, 2009 - As Antigua and Barbuda awaits final word from the International Monetary Fund (IMF) on a loan it says it needs, victims of the alleged Stanford fraud are trying to stop the twin-island nation from accessing any funds from the lending agency.

In its latest campaign against the island, the Stanford Victims Coalition (SVC), through lawyers from the New York firm Morgenstern & Blue LLC, has written to members of Congress to get help blocking any IMF loan.

Antigua and Barbuda recently held talks with the Washington-based institution and are close to a final deal, although the amount it would receive has not yet been finalised.

But the SVC, an international advocacy group formed after the collapse of Sir Allen Stanford's empire, wants to prevent Antigua and Barbuda from getting any money unless it takes steps to compensate those who lost their money in the US$8 billion fraud which US authorities said Stanford committed through his Antigua-based Stanford International Bank (SIB).