Washington – The world’s largest economies must do more to halt a global economic slide, and more government stimulus will be a top US priority at an international financial summit next month, President Barack Obama said Wednesday.

Ahead of April’s Group of 20 (G20) gathering of the world’s leading economies, Obama warned against protectionist moves and acknowledged that developing countries were being “hard hit” by the fallout from an economic crisis that largely began in the United States.

Obama cited the aggressive moves already taken by the United States – including an unprecedented 787-billion-dollar stimulus package – and suggested other countries must do more to halt the slide of their own economies.

“As aggressive as the actions we are taking have been so far, it’s very important to make sure that other countries are moving in the same direction, because the global economy is all tied together,” Obama said in a meeting with Treasury Secretary Timothy Geithner.

Geithner and other G20 finance ministers will gather outside London this weekend to prepare for the April 2 summit, which will mark Obama’s first trip overseas since taking office in January.

Obama’s comments came amid a growing rift with the European Union over how to deal with the economic crisis. Luxembourg Prime Minister Jean-Claude Juncker on Monday rejected US pressure on EU governments to inject more funds into their economies.

EU leaders want the G20 summit to focus more on a broad overhaul of global financial regulations, which failed to avert the near- collapse of the US financial system in September that sparked the global crisis. The US views that as one of a series of priorities.

The Treasury Department in a separate statement said G20 countries were “falling short” of what was needed to boost global demand and called for greater, longer and joint government action. The global economy is expected to contract this year for the first time since World War II.

“It is essential that G20 countries as a group boost and sustain aggressive fiscal actions because common action magnifies the favourable impacts of fiscal stimulus for all countries,” the Treasury said.

The US also said it would push for an additional 500 billion dollars for the International Monetary Fund to help developing countries deal with massive budget shortfalls and plummeting demand due to the global recession.

Obama said he would use the London gathering to “make sure also that we are not falling into protectionist patterns” in reaction to the global recession. The US will suggest the creation of a new global fund to help revive world trade, which the World Bank predicts will fall this year to its lowest level in 80 years.

A number of countries have increased trade barriers in efforts to protect domestic jobs and industries. The United States has sought to block government funds from the stimulus package from going to foreign companies and offered emergency loans to US carmakers to keep them alive.

“The United States is part of an integrated global economy and so we have to think not only about what’s going on here at home,” Obama said. “We also have to be mindful about what’s happening overseas.” (dpa)