26-1-10 President Chavez of Venezuala has cancelled the debt owed by Haiti to Petrocaribe, the Venezuala-backed oil fund. Speaking at a meeting of foreign ministers from the ALBA trade alliance, Chavez in protested that "Haiti has no debt with Venezuela -- on the contrary, it is Venezuela that has a historic debt with Haiti." The cancellation will be worth about $295 miliion, approximately a third of Haiti's outstanding international debt. Follow this link to read the full story.

The IMF executive board, meanwhile, are pressing ahead with their plan to deliver relief to the earthquake-stricken country in the form of loans rather than grants, although they state that this loan will have no policy conditions attached to it, and has no repayments due on it for five years. The decision was reached at the Montreal donors conference and contradicts earlier statement made by the head of the IMF, Dominic Strauss-Kahn, that Haiti's outstanding debts to the IMF would be cancelled. You can also read the full IMF statement here.