GEITHNER 2 LST

There is a huge amount of promise in the G-20 framework
for cooperation in international, economic and financial
issues, Geithner said.
He said the initial response to the financial crisis has
demonstrated that they want to make sure that they carry
forward the momentum of the commitment to cooperation on the
rest of the international reform agenda.
They have also shown a broad interest in strengthening
the multilateral financial institutions and on trying to make
sure that as recovery strengthens they are putting in place a
more balanced pattern of growth globally that will provide
prospective of a more durable, stable recovery in the future,
he said.
By establishing a long-term relationship with India,
Geithner explained, the US wants to build a much stronger
cooperative bilateral partnership on broader global financial
issues, which he thinks are important to both countries.
"We think that as we are reforming the architecture of
the system, we want to make sure that countries like India are
playing a rule of compensability to overcome (the crisis)
using their economic strengths. As we do as much as we can, we
understand where relative interest lies and how we can advance
those interests," he said.
Geithner, who would be meeting Prime Minister Manmohan
Singh besides Finance Minister Mukherjee and other top Indian
officials, said he does not "actually sense a lot of tension
or disagreement with India" on the core parts of global
financial reforms.
But that does not mean it is not worth talking about it
because it is good for both countries to be close on these
things, he observed.
"As you know we are going through a transforming set of
reforms here in the financial sector and we have negotiated in
the G-20 process a set of broader international principles for
reform so that we are moving in parallel, not separately in
this area and I am sure I will have a chance to talk with them
about what we are doing in the United States and what we want
to see by the major economies as well," said the Treasury
Secretary.
To a question about the sense of dismay in India on some
of the statements made by the US President about American jobs
being 'Bangalored', Geithner said: "This President understands
deeply, as much as any President in American history and may
be more because of his personal experience, how important the
world is to the United States, economically, strategically."
"He (Obama) understands that America would be stronger if
the world was stronger. So I think you will see in him
policies that are completely consistent with that basic
orientation, that basic judgment, those basic values." PTI