Caisse de la Dette Publique
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The Caisse de la Dette Publique ("Public Debt Commission", Arabic: صندوق الدين في مصر, romanized: ṣundūq ad-dayn fī-Miṣr) was an international commission established by a decree issued by Khedive Isma'il of Egypt on 2 May 1876 to supervise the payment by the Egyptian government of the loans to the European governments following several modernisation projects including the construction of the Suez Canal.[1] The Khedive had defaulted on paying back Egypt's foreign debts, which were mostly owned to the British and the French. These governments in turn joined to impose a system of supervision over Egypt's debts.[2] The goal of the commission was to investigate everything regarding Egypt's foreign debts; what Egypt could afford to pay, in what way the taxes were collected, how high the amount of floating debt was, and how that debt had been incurred.[3]