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PARIS - British finance minister Alistair Darling said in an interview with European newspapers on Wednesday that financial markets face an "enormous" problem that requires policy makers to act quickly.
Central bankers in Europe have acted together in recent months with the US Federal Reserve to keep credit markets from seizing up and throwing the global economy into a slowdown. Darling said finance ministers will be discussing further actions at various meetings in the near future.
"The financial market crisis is significant and requires rapid action," Darling said in the interview released by French business daily La Tribune.
"We are facing an enormous problem. We will discuss it again at the meeting of the G7 in Tokyo in February and in the framework of the IMF (International Monetary Fund)," he said.
The interview, conducted jointly with German business daily Handelsblatt and Italy's Il Sole 24 Ore, was set to appear on newsstands in Thursday's editions as Darling meets finance ministers from France, Italy and Germany in Paris.
"Through their role in Europe and in the G7, the four countries share the objective of doing everything possible at government level and, separately, by the central banks, to find a solution to the crisis on financial markets and prevent future crises," he said.
Darling said central banks had sent a strong signal in December through their joint injection of cash into financial markets threatened by a dry-up of funding.
"This coordination can only be beneficial," he said.
"What markets want above all, is to know that central banks are aware of their problems. I would add that authorities have to do their part but it is up to companies to be more transparent for markets."
He said a common approach to sovereign wealth funds, whose growing interest in acquiring stakes in European companies has caused concern in some countries, was not on the agenda and he said Britain welcomed such funds "as long as they play by the rules of the market."
"We would be alarmed if these funds followed a political, rather than a commercial logic," he said.
Darling noted that he had cut Britain's 2008 growth outlook in October to between 2.0-2.5 per cent to take account of the market crisis but he said British economic fundamentals were solid and he was optimistic about growth in the world economy.
His comments were translated into French by La Tribune.
- REUTERS
