The International Monetary Fund (IMF) now has less than $10 billion to deal with a financial crisis in Asia that is far from being resolved, US Deputy Treasury Secretary Lawrence Summers warned yesterday.

Mr Summers also turned up the pressure on Japan, stressing that it cannot delay measures to stimulate growth because they are "crucial to the future of the world economy". Mr Summers urged Congress to back additional funding for the beleaguered IMF. Failure to support the IMF, for which the administration wants Congress to authorise $18 billion, "is simply not a risk we should take", Mr Summers said.

The Fund has so far pledged $35 billion to rescue the troubled economies of Thailand, South Korea and Indonesia.

"The crises have taken their toll on the IMF's resources, and as of today, the IMF has less than 10 billion dollars that it could prudently use to respond to an intensification of the present crisis.

Without the IMF, he added, the United States would have been put under much heavier pressure "to respond unilaterally with taxpayer resources."