Here's a round up of the 10 days we hosted Kusfiardi in Scotland for a speaker tour to highlight the campaign to cancel Indonesia's arms debt owed to the UK government.

All in all the speaker tour was a huge success inspiring people all over Scotland to think about and take action on the issue of Indonesia's debt.

The speaker tour was arranged so that we could hold public meetings in as many constituencies as possible across Scotland and give Kusfiardi a platform to stress the importance of this issue.

Alongside Ardi we showed the documentary by John Pilger the 'New Rulers of the World' which highlights the role of the World Bank and IMF in the economic colonisation of Indonesia.

After the film and Ardi's presentation the audience were invited to put questions to Ardi and it was at this stage that people started debating and discussing the various issues that came up in the presentation and film.

The main themes of the discussions were the shock and horror of what was being done to Indonesia through the slavery of debt. Appreciation that the issue of Indonesia's debt was as much about injustice on the part of the lenders as it was about the debts' devastating impact on poverty, and how the debt was not just a financial burden on Indonesia but was a burden that limited Indonesia's scope to control its own affairs (how debt transferred national sovereignty from Indonesia to its creditors).

Ardi was keen to elaborate on the themes of his discussion and was particularly keen to stress how the economic elite in Indonesia were undermining his country in what he called the 'Berkeley Mafia', (essentially through a generation of neo-liberal economists taught at Berkeley University in the US and put in place in the Indonesian government during the past 30 years)

Sometimes the audience were bewildered by what they could do to support Ardi and he was at hand to stress the importance of supporting Jubilee Scotland's campaign to cancel the arms debt owed to the UK government. He said that by concentrating on this one particular odious debt and campaigning for its cancellation that we can highlight the bigger issue of Indonesia's economic injustice and debt slavery.

Those attending were encouraged to sign petitions and to respond to calls for lobbies of their local MPs.
After each meeting it felt as if we had spread our campaign a little further as well as meeting some amazing new friends along the way...

for more information and photos from the speaker tour take a look at our blog by clicking here