Zimbabwe should seek HIPC debt relief, minister says

LONDON, Sept 26 (Reuters) - Zimbabwe should aim to have its debt to international financial institutions cancelled by seeking access to the Heavily Indebted Poor Countries (HIPC) initiative, a Zimbabwean minister said on Saturday.

Gorden Moyo, minister of state in Prime Minister Morgan Tsvangirai's office, said it would be immoral for Zimbabwe to pay off its debts to the International Monetary Fund, World Bank and African Development Bank when it could not pay teachers.

"We should be having conversations with the international financial institutions to get them to either reschedule our debt or to cancel our debt," he said, speaking at a Zimbabwe investment conference in London.

Moyo noted that the IMF and World Bank had launched the HIPC initiative in 1996 to help countries unable to pay their debts.

Some people did not want Zimbabwe classified as a heavily indebted poor country, "but that's what we are, if you look at our debt ratios, if you look at our economy", he said.

"We just need to be reclassified and get our debt cancelled. Once we get our debt cancelled, the country will begin to have access to World Bank resources," he said.