US Treasury Secretary John Snow on Monday urged European countries to continue to pursue reforms to boost their domestic growth, saying this would also be in the global economy's interests. Speaking at a news conference after meeting Dutch Finance Minister Gerrit Zalm, Snow turned aside on a question whether he was disappointed by Dutch and French rejection of the new EU constitution in recent referendums.
"I think the important thing is that Europe continue to focus on the things that need to be done to encourage domestic growth," Snow said. "These are essentially national policy as opposed to EU policy."
Snow said it was important for Europe to boost its overall growth to help the United States deal with its record trade and current account deficits as well.
"I think the countries of Europe will be able to get to a posture where they reward their citizens with higher growth," Snow said.
Snow, who participated in a weekend meeting in London of G8 finance ministers that agreed to cancel more than $40 billion of debt owed to 18 of the world's poorest countries, said the United States was taking action to cut its deficits.