President Obama played peacemaker in a spat.....

[monmouth]

Source: Obama Plays Peacemaker in French-Chinese Smackdown Over Tax Havens

April 02, 2009 11:15 AM

This was reported by Jake Tapper.......www.abcnews.com



According to a source inside the room, President Obama just played peacemaker in a spat between French President Nicolas Sarkozy and Hu Jintao, President of the People's Republic of China.

Sarkozy and Hu were having a heated disagreement about tax havens. France and other European nations have been pushing for rules and regulations to apply to various tax havens; Germany's Finance Minister Peer Steinbrueck has said "these tax havens are also places where unregulated financial market deals are made."

But Chinese leaders fear a crackdown would hurt banking centers in Macao and Hong Kong.

The exchange between Sarkozy and Hu got so heated, the source says, it was threatening the unity of the G-20 leaders' meeting.

But Mr. Obama, according to this account, stepped between the two men, urging them to try to find consensus, and giving them a "pep talk" about the importance of working together.

We don't know yet what, if anything, the G-20 leaders have agreed upon, but British Prime Minister Gordon Brown announced Thursday afternoon that "we have agreed to tough standards for those (tax shelters) who don't come into line in the future."