Brown to seek action on credit in US

British Prime Minister Gordon Brown will tell Wall Street bankers today to reveal their losses quickly to help end a global credit…

British Prime Minister Gordon Brown will tell Wall Street bankers today to reveal their losses quickly to help end a global credit crunch.

On a three-day tour of the United States, which is already teetering on the edge of recession, Brown will also meet President George W. Bush tomorrow and Federal Reserve chief Ben Bernanke on Friday for their take on the market turmoil.

He kicks off the trip today at the United Nations with breakfast with Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon, followed by a Security Council session on how to fund peacekeeping in Africa and put in place adequate post-conflict reconstruction there.

The election stalemate in Zimbabwe and violence in Darfur will also be discussed, British officials said before his trip.

With the British economy slowing and his poll ratings dropping at the sharpest rate for any leader since World War Two, Mr Brown is anxious to show he is in control of the economy he managed as finance minister during a decade of prosperity.

Yesterday, he met senior bankers in London to discuss what steps might be taken to help end the credit crunch that has raged for eight months because of financial institutions' exposure to plunging US real estate prices.

Mr Brown will have a similar meeting with top Wall Street names in New York on Wednesday, British officials said. He wants banks to disclose their losses quickly so they resume lending to each other and bring down borrowing costs for consumers.

The Bank of England has cut interest rates three times since last December but the government is worried the reduction is not being passed to consumers, exacerbating housing market problems.

Mr Brown will meet Mr Bush in Washington tomorrow. "The key priority will be the economy," said a British official. "The prime minister and president will want to discuss the global economy ahead of the G8."

The G8 - made up of seven leading industrial economies and Russia - holds a summit in Japan from July 7th to 9th.