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PARIS : European leaders have agreed to ask for the early release of 32 billion euros in European funds to help small businesses weather the global finance crisis, British Prime Minister Gordon Brown said Saturday.
"This crisis that has come from America has affected all businesses, so we agreed to ask the European Investment Bank to frontload 25 billion pounds (44 billion dollars) of finance for small business loans," Brown said following a crisis meeting in Paris.
"We also agreed to do far more to clean up the system where there has been irresponsibility and we agreed that we will set up a college of regulators," he told a joint press conference with French, German and Italian leaders.
Brown said before heading to the talks he would seek the release of 15 billion euros (21 billion dollars) from the European Investment Bank to help provide small business loans.
EU finance ministers agreed earlier this month to hike public lending to credit-starved small and mid-sized firms, allowing the European Investment Bank would lend 30 billion euros to such firms by 2011.
They also authorised the EIB to increase its lending to 15 billion euros over the 2008-2009 period.
Asked afterwards to spell out the European proposal, Brown said: "The initial proposal was 12 billion pounds for first two years, 25 billion over four years. We're now asking to frontload all 25 billion now."
Brown, French President Nicolas Sarkozy, German Chancellor Angela Merkel and Italian Prime Minister Silvio Berlusconi were meeting to try to coordinate their response to the crisis rocking the world's banks.
The four leaders vowed to help European banks and financial institutions in trouble but also to sanction the heads of failed banks.
"Where action has to be taken we will continue to do whatever is necessary to preserve the stability of the financial system," Brown told the press conference.
"The message to families and businesses is that, as our central banks are already doing, liquidity will be assured in order to preserve confidence and stability."
The European leaders called jointly for a Group of Eight industrial powers summit as soon as possible to review rules governing financial markets.
"We agreed that we must do more to coordinate our response in times of crisis and in the interest of stability," Brown said.
"I believe that the coordination that we are showing across Europe will now be repeated by the international meetings we are proposing."
- AFP /ls
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