The leaders of the world’s most powerful countries were to pursue talks yesterday on settling their differences over how to nurse the world economy back to health.
The G20 nations convened in Toronto on the heels of a tough-talking G8 summit, in which the world’s major industrialized powers laid down the law to rogue operators Iran and North Korea.
US officials called on leading economies to focus on a return to growth, in a move set to pit the world’s top economy against European nations, some of whom have ordered spending cuts to slash back public deficits.
“This summit must be fundamentally about growth, and our challenge, as the G20, is that we all need to act to strengthen the prospects for growth,” US Treasury Secretary Timothy Geithner said.
He took a swipe at powers like Germany, Britain and Japan that he fears have moved too quickly toward budget cuts.
“It’s fair to say that I don’t think that you’ve seen from those countries yet a set of policies that would, again, give everybody confidence that you’re going to see stronger domestic demand growth,” he said.
The G20 talks opened late on Saturday with battle lines being drawn as members disagreed over the balance to be struck between reducing budget deficits and encouraging growth and spending.
Brazil warned that Europe’s plans to cut government spending would hurt emerging economies, comments echoed by UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon.
Ban also warned the G20 working dinner that the challenge facing the group had changed from when it first came together in Pittsburgh in September.
He called for greater investment in agriculture and the green economy, which could help fuel jobs.
French President Nicolas Sarkozy stuck up for Europe, insisting there was no deep trans-Atlantic rift on the deficit issue.
“I’ve heard Obama say how important it is to support sustainable policies, including for the United States, he has indicated quite clearly the risk posed by deficits and debt,” he told reporters
Signs also emerged that the US position may not be as firm as it seems.
The New York Times yesterday cited officials from US President Barack Obama administration as saying that despite its public pitches for more stimulus measures, the US will go along with other leaders who are more concerned about rising debt and join in a commitment to cut their governments’ deficits in half by 2013.
At the end of two days of talks, the leaders of the G8 richest nations acknowledged in their final statement that economic recovery remained “fragile.”
The leaders of Britain, Canada, France, Germany, Italy, Japan, Russia and the US also took a tough stand on pressing international problems.
They demanded Iran reveal the extent of its nuclear program in transparent talks, condemned North Korea’s alleged torpedo attack on a South Korean warship and urged Afghanistan to boost efforts to take charge of its security.
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