BRITAIN is edging towards a “Europe only” deal in its efforts to boost aid for Africa after Gordon Brown was unable to win round the US to backing his key proposals during weekend talks in Washington.

In the latest setback to Britain’s drive to increase aid flows to Africa and write off the debts of the world’s poorest countries, the talks among finance ministers from the Group of Seven (G7) leading economies again failed to clinch a deal on concrete measures.

Instead, the ministers agreed to continue discussions and negotiations over their rival schemes. The Chancellor, speaking at the end of a 24-hour trip to the meetings in the American capital, insisted that he was still hopeful of reaching a deal to which all the world’s big economies, including the US, could sign up.

Mr Brown predicted that, despite the rapidly diminishing time to resolve differences within the G7, an agreement would be reached in time for the summit of G7 leaders at Gleneagles in July. “Everyone accepted that there must be more money for debt relief,” he said. “We believe that will come at Gleneagles.”

But the Chancellor conceded that it might not be possible to bring the Bush Administration on board and that it was conceivable that Britain and other European countries would have to act without the United States in a “coalition of the committed”.

“That’s a possibility, yes. But I would hope that we can get all the major countries involved in one way or another,” he said.

Washington is firmly opposed to British proposals to sell off or revalue part of the vast gold reserves held by the International Monetary Fund to fund a 100 per cent write-off of the debts of poor African nations. The Bush Administration’s stance was underlined again by John Snow, the US Treasury Secretary, who said: “We are not persuaded by arguments for IMF debt relief, and we do not believe market, or off-market gold sales are necessary or warranted.”

After the IMF produced a paper examining the logistics of using its gold reserves in a debt write-off, concluding that a sale of up to 16 million ounces from its 103.4 million ounces of bullion would be possible without disrupting the gold market, there was no further direct mention of gold in the G7’s communiqué this weekend.

Mr Brown denied that the idea was no longer on the table. “I don’t think it is true at all to say it has disappeared,” he said.

But Ralph Goodale, the Canadian Finance Minister, told reporters that US objections would prove decisive. “So, whatever the merit of the argument might be, it’s not going to pass,” he said.

The lack of agreement on gold sales was denounced by aid campaigners.

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