Spanish theme park halts debt payments

[Brian Turner]

Spain's biggest theme park - launched four years ago in an attempt to rival Disneyland Paris - has admitted it can no longer pay its debts. Terra Mitica, in the Costa Blanca tourist trap of Benidorm, offers visitors a chance to relive ancient Mediterranean civilisations.

But although it aimed for 3 million visitors a year, it has achieved less than one-third of that figure.

Construction went over budget, and the park owes 161m euros ($193m; £108m).

"Stopping payments is the only way to guarantee the viability of the company," said director general John Fitzgerald, who insisted that the park would try to keep its doors open.

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/business/3732735.stm