Indians give US$25m for Guyana venue

GEORGETOWN: India will give Guyana US$25 million in grants and loans to build a new stadium to host matches of the Cricket World Cup in 2007, officials said yesterday. Work on the 20,000-seat stadium will start early next year and be completed by the end of 2006, said Guyana government spokesman Robert Persaud.

Guyana will host six preliminary matches of the World Cup, with other matches in Trinidad, Jamaica, Grenada, St Kitts, Barbados, Antigua and St Lucia. It will mark the first time the event is held in the Caribbean since it began in England in 1975. The stadium deal was reached after months of negotiations between India and Guyana, a former British colony where half of its 700,000 people are of Indian descent. The package includes a US$6 million grant and a US$19 million loan to be repaid over 20 years at a 1.7 percent annual interest rate, said Avinash Gupta, India’s ambassador to Guyana.