PM Brown Threatens To Sue Iceland

A diplomatic row between the UK and Iceland has erupted with PM Brown demanding the return of billions of pounds of British investments. He has threatened to seize assets and take legal action against the Icelandic government. Sky's Glen Oglaza reports.

It's 30 years since the so-called Cod Wars. The relations between London and Reykjavik are almost as frosty now as they were then, with the prime minister using the most undiplomatic of language and threatening to sue the government of Iceland.

We believe that, and I think everybody at least home will agree that the Icelandic authorities are responsible for this. We'll do what we can, working with local authorities to help. And I think we, as the government, are doing the responsible thing. We are holding the Icelandic authorities responsible with demanding that the money be paid back to the local authorities. (Through Legal action?) And we are prepared to consider all forms of action including as we did, attempting to, and freezing assets.

The problem is that it's not only Iceland's banks that have crashed. Yesterday, the British government used anti-terror laws to freeze the assets of those banks. But now, the Icelandic government is in fact defaulting. "Totally unacceptable!", says Gordon Brown, threatening legal action something Iceland's prime minister is keen to avoid.

Legal action is something that is always available. That's one way of civilizing, excuse me, it's one way of setting disputes in a civilized manner, go to courts, but I don't know we're...we're hoping and planning to try to resolve this issue in good cooperation with the UK authorities.

More than a hundred local authorities placed large sums of money on deposit with Icelandic banks. The total amount is hundreds of millions and could be as much as a billion pounds. That money is needed to revive the goods and services run by local councils. The local authority leaders say they can't guarantee those goods and services unless they get their money back.

Until we've actually looked to the implications, for each local authority, the sum is very large and it will be a small amount in the total context of the budget; others, it will be a much greater impact. We still haven't assessed that fully...

And then there are the police authorities, who also invested in Icelandic banks and now stands to lose the best part of 100 million pounds.

The government's now embroiled in a huge row with the governments of Iceland. But while ministers say they're doing what they can to help local councils retrieve those missing millions, they are also asking question what on earth you have been doing with tax payers' money. The councils reply "we invested it in banks that we thought were safe."

But safe? They were not. And Gordon Brown is making it crystal clear that he expects the government of Iceland to underwrite the debts of its banks and to pay up.

Glen Oglaza, Sky News.

参考中文翻译：

所谓的冷战到现在已经30年之久的。但是现在伦敦和雷克雅未克之间的关系仍然像以前一样僵，英国首相布朗使用非外交辞令，威胁会起诉冰岛政府。

我相信，我认为每个人，至少是国内的每一个人都同意，冰岛官方需要为此负责。我们会尽我们所能与当地官方团结一致以提供帮助。我认为，作为政府，我们所作的事情是负责任的。我们认为冰岛政府有责任将资金归还当地政府。（会不会通过法律途径？）我们准备考虑所有的方式，包括我们已经采取的措施，冻结资产。

问题是，并不是只有冰岛的银行崩溃。昨天，英国政府利用反恐怖法冻结了那些银行的资产。但是现在，冰岛政府不付欠款。“这是完全不能接受的！”布朗首相说，威胁说会采取冰岛首相极力避免的法律手段。

法律手段总是可以采取的。这是一种文明的，处理争端的文明的方式，上法庭。但是我不知道我们……我们希望通过和英国政府的友好合作来解决这个问题。

100多家当地银行在冰岛银行存储了大量现金，总数高达数亿甚至十亿元。当地委员会需要这些钱来恢复货物和服务供给。当地政府官员说，除非这些钱能够被归还，否则他们不能保证那些货物和服务。

我们仔细考虑一下，对于每一个当地的政府，这些钱是非常大的数目，对于整个国家预算来说非常少；而对于其他人来说，将会造成很大的影响。我们没有全面的评估……

还有警察机关，他们也对冰岛银行进行了投资，现在随时可能损失1亿英镑。

政府现在卷入和冰岛政府的争端。但是当统治者们尽一切可能来帮助当地委员会取回即将丢失的数百万时，他们也在问一个问题：你们到底拿着纳税人的钱做什么了？委员会的答案是“我们投资于银行，以为是银行是安全的。”

但是安全吗？未必。布朗已经让这一点非常明显了。他希望冰岛政府承认欠款并且尽快归还。