Venezuela on Thursday announced plans to restructure its burgeoning foreign debt, a move that may lead to a default by the cash-strapped OPEC nation whose collapsing socialist economy has left its population struggling to find food and medicine.
President Nicolas Maduro vowed to make a $1.1 billion payment on a bond maturing on Thursday, but also created a commission to study "restructuring of all future payments" in order to meet the needs of citizens.
Venezuela has few avenues to do that though because of sanctions by the United States that bar American banks from participating in or even negotiating such deals.