October 17, 2007 (LPAC) -- Argentina's President and Finance Minister Miguel Peirano had sharp words for the IMF's outgoing Managing Director Rodrigo Rato, who used one of his last press conferences in Washington on October 15 to attack Argentina for failing to impose the same austerity policies that plunged that nation into economic disaster in the late 1990s.

Rato demanded that Argentina devalue its currency, raise interest rates, and reduce public spending, in order to "normalize" its economy and fight the "overheating" caused by rising inflation.

President Nestor Kirchner rebuffed Rato in an October 17 speech to an audience of local and foreign bankers. Recalling the devastation that the country suffered as a result of the British free-market policies imposed in the 1990s, he noted that "Unfortunately, there were lessons of basic economics that we Argentines had to learn, because of everything that happened to us. And we don't have to have those same things repeated, which led us to an unsustainable crisis," Kirchner said.

In an October 12 speech, Kirchner pointed out that the "cooling off" policies applied in the 1990s, didn't just cool off the economy; "they froze it, and then they froze all of us Argentines!" Those days are gone, he said.

Finance Minister Miguel Peirano didn't mince words on Rato's demands. "They are a reflection of [the IMF's] intention to audit our economic policies, when the government of Nestor Kirchner maintains autonomy from the Fund." The Managing Director's statements "underscore the IMF's absolutely negative role, where instead of helping countries to develop... it has acted permanently with the intention of being a gendarme in the region. The IMF's role has been negative," he added. "End of discussion."