Bush boosts Africa aid as G8 talks continue

Britain called last-ditch talks yesterday to hammer out an agreed agenda for next week's Group of Eight summit and welcomed Washington's announcement that it would double aid to Africa over the next decade.

But aid agencies dismissed the sums as paltry and Prime Minister Tony Blair's twin goals of massively boosting help for the world's poorest continent and agreeing a strategy to tackle climate change continued to look elusive.

As part of an effort to double US assistance to Africa by 2010, President George W. Bush said he would ask the US Congress to spend $1.2 billion until 2008 to help fight malaria, which claims an estimated 1.2 million lives a year worldwide, 95 per cent of them in sub-Saharan Africa.

But his administration still rejects a far more ambitious British plan for Africa - an "International Finance Facility" to raise an extra $50 billion in aid up front by issuing bonds using future development budgets as collateral.

Mr Blair's office seized on Mr Bush's move as proof that Britain could turn the G8 summit in the Scottish hotel of Gleneagles, which it is hosting, into a historic success.

"(The) announcement today to more than double aid to Africa by 2010 is an important and welcome step and creates real momentum for a successful outcome," a Blair spokesman said.

Campaign groups were dismissive.

"This is a very modest step forward that is being spun as a colossal leap," said Patrick Watt of ActionAid. He said the increase from $4 to $8 billion per year over five years equated to just two days of US military spending.

Washington is also blocking progress on climate change, an issue which even Mr Blair has admitted will be "very difficult".

In a leaked draft text for the summit, the sentences "Our world is warming" and "We know that the increase is due in large part to human activity" are in brackets, indicating US disagreement by marking them out for possible deletion.

Mr Blair may face a hard choice - split with his close ally Mr Bush and get a strong climate agreement with other G8 members or stay with him, get a weak deal and be blamed for missing a crucial opportunity.

Pressure is building most strongly over Africa.

Twenty years after organising the Live Aid concerts for famine aid in Africa, Bob Geldof has persuaded dozens of pop acts to grace stages across the world tomorrow in a Live 8 extravaganza.

It will be watched by hundreds of millions of people and aims to press G8 leaders into doing more to end African poverty.

"We are saying to them don't lower that bar, don't lower expectations now, go for the full deal," said Adrian Lovett of pressure group Make Poverty History.

Britain is hosting last-minute talks in London today and tomorrow to twist the arms of reluctant partners.

Officials always meet before summits to thrash out the details of proposed accords but it is unusual for hard negotiations to take place this late, suggesting Mr Blair is unhappy with the degree of accord reached so far.

"We are continuing negotiations because we want to get the best possible package," said one British official.

One G8 diplomat said leaders faced a stormy summit as Mr Blair showed little sign of wanting to compromise. Another said there may even be another round of officials' talks in Gleneagles next week, as the summit gets under way, in a last throw of the dice.

"We have come a long way but still have a long way to go," UK finance minister Gordon Brown told Parliament yesterday.