Sumeet Desai

Britain's opposition Conservatives said on Friday they would try to form a government with the smaller Liberal Democrats.

The G20 will promise this weekend to keep economic support packages in place until recovery is certain.

G20 finance ministers promised money to rescue troubled emerging market economies and said they would use monetary firepower to combat the downturn.

Britain will inject billions of pounds into state-owned Northern Rock to try to unlock lending and help the economy emerge from recession.

The G7 meet in Rome this week to kick off a run of high-profile meetings among leaders wrestling to get recession-hit economies back on their feet.

Britain threw its troubled banks their second multibillion-pound lifeline in three months on Monday.

Britain is set to announce its second bank rescue and the incoming US administration said it will make its funds work harder to get credit flowing.

Britain will inject up to £50-billion of government money into the country's banks as part of a multibillion-pound package.

UK nationalised Bradford & Bingley on Monday, making the mortgage lender the second bank to be taken into public ownership this year.

UK could nationalise troubled mortgage lender Bradford & Bingley in the third rescue of a major bank this year, people familiar with the matter said.

Prime Minister Gordon Brown defied his critics on Tuesday, vowing to stick by his beliefs and fight to make life better for people living in Britain.

New British Prime Minister Gordon Brown named a rising star and reported critic of the Iraq war, David Miliband, as Foreign Minister on Thursday in a wide-ranging government shake-up. The jobs given to other Brown allies underlined the priorities of his policy agenda.