Obama slams Republicans for rejecting 'fair deal'

WASHINGTON: US President Barack Obama confirmed late Friday that tough negotiations with his Republican foes on averting an early August debt default had collapsed.

Republican US House Speaker John Boehner, meanwhile, announced he was pulling out of talks with the White House on averting an early August debt default and would work with the Senate to reach a deal.

"I have decided to end discussions with the White House and begin conversations with the leaders of the Senate in an effort to find a path forward," Boehner said in a letter to members of the House of Representatives.

The move cast doubt on the fate of efforts to raise the US debt limit by August 2, when the cash-strapped government of the world's richest nation will run out of money to pay its bills.

Obama slammed his Republican foes for walking away from an "extraordinarily fair" deal and called new talks with congressional leaders on Saturday at 11:00 am (1500 GMT).

"Essentially what we had offered Speaker Boehner was over a trillion dollars in cuts to discretionary spending. Both domestic and defense," Obama told reporters in a hastily-arranged press conference.

"It is hard to understand why Speaker Boehner would walk away from this kind of deal and frankly, if you look at the commentary out there, there are a lot of Republicans puzzled as to why it couldn't get done."

He said the American people were "fed up" with political posturing.

Copyright AFP (Agence France-Presse), 2011