Washington ? The International Monetary Fund and Argentina ended 11 months of negotiations Thursday by announcing an agreement on new loans to keep the cash-strapped nation from defaulting on its obligations to the IMF.

The agreement will be transmitted to fund executives in Washington and presented to the IMF’s 24-member executive board for review “in the coming days,” said spokesman Thomas Dawson.

In Buenos Aires, President Eduardo Duhalde said the country would dip into its reserves to make a $1 billion payment it owes to the IMF. Until now, Duhalde had refused to make most debt payments to international lenders, saying it risked his ability to control monetary policy.

“The money we are paying will be returned to us — that’s part of the agreement that we have achieved,” he said.

Armando Torres, a spokesman for Argentina’s economy ministry, confirmed the payment was made late Thursday. The deadline for reaching a deal on new loans was today, when the $1 billion payment to the IMF was due.

Officials said the IMF’s executive board would probably have an informal session today to review the agreement but approval of the deal might not occur until next week.

It was expected that the new loans would total about $6 billion, enough to meet obligations to the IMF and other multilateral lending institutions through midyear, and facilitate presidential elections on April 27. A successor to Duhalde is to take office on May 25.

Argentina failed to meet a $680 million payment due Wednesday to the Inter-American Development Bank. In November, Argentina defaulted on all but a fraction of an $805 million loan due the World Bank.

A default to the IMF would have cut the country off from its last source of foreign loans.