Brown to hold crisis pow-wow

Leaders of the four biggest economies in the EU and the European Commission President will meet in London on 29 January to discuss responses to the current financial market crisis.

The meeting has been convened by UK Prime Minister Gordon Brown and will be attended by French President Nicolas Sarkozy, German Chancellor Angela Merkel, Italian Prime Minister Romano Prodi and Commission President José Manuel Barroso. It will discuss the current state of financial markets and the global economy. The agenda is expected to include discussion of measures to improve transparency in the banking system, greater co-ordination among national financial market supervisors, the role of credit rating agencies and steps to strengthen risk management.

Brown is emphasising the role of international financial institutions in dealing with the crisis and wants the International Monetary Fund to develop an early warn-ing system to detect future market crises.

But there may be a clash of philosophies at the meeting as Italy is keen for stronger central EU supervision of financial markets while the UK wants national authorities to retain their powers.

The meeting will also discuss climate change following the summit last December in Bali to kickstart negotiations on a successor to the Kyoto Protocol and the Commission’s adoption on 23 January of a package of proposals for the EU to meet its greenhouse gas reduction targets.

Leaders of the four biggest economies in the EU and the European Commission President will meet in London on 29 January to discuss responses to the current financial market crisis.