US refuses to rescue indebted European nations through IMF

While major European nations have agreed to lend the International Monetary Fund (IMF) up to €150 billion in bilateral loans to help tackle the debt crisis in the continent, the US is refusing to chip in with funds.

EU leaders agreed over the weekend at a summit in Brussels that euro zone states and even other donors should provide the IMF up to €200 billion in bilateral loans (with €150 billion being Europe's contribution) to help rescue countries including possibly Italy and Spain.

But the US, which pitched in with $100 billion in 2009 to help the IMF rescue the world from sinking further into recession, has refused to do so this time.

''Europe is wealthy enough that there's no reason why they can't solve this problem,'' American president Barack Obama had declared at a news conference last week. ''It's not as if we're talking about some impoverished country that doesn't have any resources.''

A White House spokesman also reiterated that the IMF had substantial resources and ''American taxpayers are not going to have to make any more commitments to the fund.''

Even if the US administration were to decide on backing the IMF, Congress is unlikely to allow it to do so; 26 Republican senators have introduced a bill seeking to prevent the IMF from using American taxpayer dollars to bail out indebted European nations. It also seeks to rescind the US credit line extended about two years ago.