US Treasury Secretary Henry Paulson is set to travel to Asia for his first gathering of the world's most powerful finance officials, before heading to China to press the case for economic reform.
Paulson, who succeeded John Snow in July, will mark his Group of Seven debut in Singapore next Saturday at the latest meeting of G7 finance ministers and central bankers.
At a time of faltering growth in the United States and nascent recoveries in Europe and Japan, the powerful club of wealthy nations is likely to reprise discussion about international currency rates.
Paulson, who will also visit China on this tour, returns to the region after last week attending a meeting of the Asia-Pacific Economic Co-operation (APEC) forum in the Vietnamese capital Hanoi.
Addressing university students in Hanoi Friday, the former Goldman Sachs boss put paid to any concerns that the US government might favour a softer exchange rate to bolster US exports.
Paulson said he was "very much in favour of a strong dollar", and dwelt on another theme - economic imbalances - that is likely to figure large both at the G7 and in his talks with Chinese leaders.
"The US needs to increase its savings rate and deal with the deficit, while Japan, China and Europe need to do more to generate domestic consumption," he said.
"We also need more currency flexibility in East Asia and in China."
The United States has long complained that China's yuan is undervalued, boosting Chinese exports at the expense of US jobs. Beijing has launched incremental currency reforms, but has stressed it will not be rushed.
In any case, according to Chinese Finance Minister Jin Renqing Friday, the yuan's exchange rate "is not the major reason that causes imbalances in the global economy".
Heading into elections for Congress in November, some US lawmakers are stepping up their clamour for China to dramatically revalue the yuan by as much as 40 percent.
The issue has become tied up with debate about reform of the International Monetary Fund, which holds its annual meeting with the World Bank in Singapore on September 19-20.
With US support, IMF members are expected to adopt an interim voting reform to give a greater say to four countries, including China, whose representation in the Fund has lagged far behind their economic growth. But under one bill sponsored by two influential senators, the US administration would be compelled to veto any increase in the IMF vote of a country with a "fundamentally misaligned" currency.
Tim Adams, Paulson's deputy for international affairs, argues that the currency debate is intrinsic to IMF reform.
Asia-Europe summit tackles trade and security
HELSINKI: Asian and European leaders meeting in Helsinki were set to deliver a strong message to the world on what to do about global warming after the Kyoto Protocol on climate change runs out in 2012, officials said Sunday.
"The basic idea is to find a platform for work after 2012," the target date for the United Nations' protocol on reducing the world's greenhouse gas emissions, said senior Finnish official Markus Lyra. A "strong message" on climate change will be included in the final communique on Monday of the Asia-Europe Meeting (ASEM) that has gathered leaders and top officials from 38 Asian and European nations, he said. Asian leaders, increasingly confident of their region's economic and political clout, were to tackle issues ranging from trade to security with their European counterparts at the two-day summit in the capital of Finland, which holds the EU's rotating presidency.
The 25-nation European Union, both curious and cautious about Asia's growing role in world affairs, was hosting leaders from China, Korea, Japan and the 10 members of the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN).
Despite criticism from human rights groups about going soft on Myanmar, Finland made an exception to an EU ban on top officials from the country's military junta entering the bloc so that Foreign Minister U Nyan Win could attend the ASEM summit.
The EU's Finnish presidency on Sunday pressed Myanmar to improve its human rights and democracy record, said Markus Lyra, who is under-secretary of state at the Finnish Foreign Ministry.
He said that U had given a "traditional" reaction, namely that "Myanmar needs more time" to make reforms.
As leaders arrived Saturday on the eve of the summit, some 200 Finnish anarchists clashed with riot police in central Helsinki to protest against the presence of leaders from China and Myanmar.
Critics have said that Europe will avoid strong criticism of China's rights abuses for fear of upsetting the growing economic giant that last year took 52 billion euros (66 billion dollars) worth of imports from the EU.
ASEM is the only forum exclusively dedicated to dialogue between Asia and Europe. But it is widely seen as being long on talk and short on substance and is still trying to prove its relevance despite having 10 years of existence behind it. While trade discussions at the summit were officially to focus on jumpstarting stalled World Trade Organisation negotiations, improving bilateral trade ties between the EU and ASEAN and between Europe and South Korea were also expected to be hot topics here, officials said.
Security issues ranging from North Korea's missiles and Iran's atomic ambitions to ensuring a steady supply of energy to fuel the two regions' economies, were also on the agenda.
South Korean President Roh Moo-Hyun was expected to use the ASEM summit as an opportunity to sell his idea of multilateral security system for north-east Asia.
He was also expected to lay out Seoul's stance on North Korea's nuclear policy and recent missile tests, which are likely to figure prominently during security discussions.
Equally concerned about North Korea's missile programme, Japanese Prime Minister Junichiro Koizumi has lobbied the host, Finnish Prime Minister Matti Vanhanen, to write concerns over Pyonyang's missile development into his chairman's statement at the conclusion of the summit.
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