CFK's harsh response to IMF: 'Argentina will accept neither pressures nor threats'

President Cristina Fernández de Kirchner used the first minutes of her speech before the UN General Assembly to harshly criticize the International Monetary Fund after Christine Lagarde’s warning on Monday. “Argentina will accept neither pressures nor threats,” she said in New York.

The Head of State spoke directly to the French leader of the organization and said: “This isn’t a football match. It’s the gravest economic and political crisis we’ve had since the 30s.”

On Monday, Lagarde had warned that the IMF would be forced to “pull a red card” if the country didn’t improve its statistics.

“My country is not a football team. It’s a sovereign nation that makes sovereign decisions, that will accept neither pressures nor threats, especially to the threat of a red card,” she added.

After her speech, the President was scheduled to meet the UN Secretary General Ban Ki-moon followed later by the Egyptian President Mohamed Morsi, in what is expected to be Fernández de Kirchner’s only bilateral contact at the Assembly.