With rich Amazon forests and fewer than a million people, Suriname is one of the few countries that absorbs more carbon than it produces. But the former Dutch colony is now being forced to implement destructive austerity by global financial interests.

This debt reached crisis proportions in the 2010s with the spending spree of the Dési Bouterse administration. Private lenders and international financial institutions queued up to make loans, often at high interest, amid the deep crash of global commodity prices. Although Bouterse is currently on the run from a twenty-year sentence for murdering political opponents, the Surinamese people still remain liable for the debts and at the mercy of anyone willing to lend money.

Even worse, the bondholders have laid claim to Suriname’s future oil revenues through a value-recovery instrument. If all goes according to plan, this will line their pockets with a staggering windfall of 30 percent of future oil revenues, up to a total of £689 million. Meanwhile, Suriname will continue to spend 27 percent of its government revenues on external debt payments over the next five years.