UN agency pushes for debt repayment breaks as poverty rates rocket

Estimated 25 low-income countries spent more than 20% of their revenues on debt servicing last year

An additional 165 million people have been pushed into extreme poverty in the world's poorest countries after a succession of economic shocks since the Covid pandemic, according to the United Nations.

In a report highlighting the human cost of inaction", the UN Development Programme (UNDP) said low-income countries urgently needed breaks from their debt repayments to cushion the blow from soaring borrowing costs.