G-8 finance ministers hold summit in Rome

rome: finance ministers from the world's top economic powers and russia meet on saturday to discuss how to weather the global economic slowdown and to prepare a summit of government leaders this month. with the united states moving aggressively to stave off recession, us treasury secretary paul o'neill was expected to press his european counterparts on what they intend to do to promote growth.germany and france, europe's two biggest economies have slashed their growth estimates just as the united states shows signs of improvement. o'neill suggested before departing for rome that a continuing tailspin in europe could undermine the us comeback. "when we slow down, they feel it. and i think it's true that we are also on the other end of that sometimes," he said thursday in washington. o'neill can point to the bush administration's $ 1.35 trillion tax cut and a series of interest rate reductions by the federal reserve - putting europe and japan on the spot. the one-day group of eight meeting involves top finance officials from the united states, japan, germany, france, britain, italy, canada and russia. they are to help prepare the economics agenda for a summit of g-8 leaders in genoa, italy, july 20-22. also on the agenda will be plans to overhaul the international monetary fund and the world bank and efforts to crack down on money laundering and tax cheating. from japan, o'neill is awaiting details on a timeline for economic reforms aimed at lifting the world's second largest economy out of a decade of weak growth. prime minister junichiro koizumi has pledged deregulation for the economy and to rid the nation's banks of huge bad loans. economists say the plans could take years to lift the japanese economy, which shrank at an annual rate of 0.8 percent in the first quarter. u.s. growth for the just-completed second quarter is expected to come in below the first quarter's 1.2 percent rate, but o'neill said he is confident growth will pick up again this year. (ap)