MercoPress. South Atlantic News Agency

Obama warns peers against giving in to “fear” and blame game

Obama admits mismatch between regulatory regimes and global capital markets

US President Barack Obama warned G20 leaders against giving in to “fear” and getting into a blame game, on the eve of the crunch summit to rescue the global economy. At a joint press conference with Gordon Brown, the president admitted that the US had some “accounting to do” over its responsibility for the crisis. But he also insisted that financial regulatory systems had been “mismatched” all around the world.

The comments came amid last-minute jockeying among G20 leaders, with the French president Nicolas Sarkozy upping the ante by suggesting he was not happy with the way negotiations were going.

The Prime Minister and Mr Obama both stressed that they believed there was considerable “common ground” among the nations and an “unprecedented” agreement would be reached. But, asked about Mr Brown's repeated claims that the crisis started in the US, Mr Obama cautioned against allowing blame to take over.

“If you look at the sources of this crisis, the US certainly has some accounting to do with respect of a regulatory system that was inadequate to the massive changes that had taken place in the global financial system,” he said.

“What is also true is that here in Great Britain, and continental Europe, around the world, we are seeing the same mismatch between the regulatory regimes that were in place and the highly integrated global capital markets that had emerged.”

He went on: “At this point I am less interested in identifying blame than in fixing the problem. I think we have taken some very aggressive steps in the United States to do so.”

The Prime Minister's spokesman later said they were hoping to reach a successful conclusion to the summit. He said: “We are making good progress, but we are not there yet. There are still a number of issues that need to be ironed out. ”I think there is emerging consensus, but not everything is yet pinned down.”