Global recession seems to be losing force, Geithner says

June 01, 2009|Associated Press

BEIJING - Treasury Secretary Timothy Geithner said today that the global recession seems to be losing force but that it will be critical for the United States and China to institute major economic reforms to put the world on a more sustained footing.

Geithner said at Peking University that a successful transition to a more balanced and stable global economy will require substantial changes to economic policy and financial regulation around the world, and especially in the world's largest and third-largest economies.

"How successful we are in Washington and Beijing will be critically important to the economic fortunes of the rest of the world," Geithner said in a major economic address at the school, where he had studied Chinese as a college student more than two decades ago.

The Obama administration's chief economic spokesman was using his first trip to China as treasury secretary to pursue closer economic ties with China, seeking to turn the page on years of acrimony between the two countries over contentious trade issues.

Geithner had told reporters on his way to Beijing that he wanted to foster the same kind of working relationship with China that the United States has enjoyed for decades with major European economic powers.

In his speech, Geithner praised the economic transformation China has achieved and avoided emphasizing past trade disputes such as the campaign waged by the Bush administration to force China to move faster to allow the yuan to rise in value against the dollar.