Obama in GM trade row
US PRESIDENT Barack Obama has stepped into the row about the future of Vauxhall and Opel as anger about General Motors’ decision to keep its European arm threatens to harm future business deals.
Obama is believed to have made an agreement with German chancellor Angela Merkel that she would co-ordinate with the US leader on the future of GM Europe.
The American government is the majority shareholder in GM but a spokesman for Merkel said Obama told her he had not been involved in the car maker’s decision to scrap the sale of Vauxhall and Opel to Magna and Russian state-owned bank Sberbank .
Vladimir Putin, the Russian prime minister, yesterday questioned his country’s future business relationship with America. GM’s decision has sparked an outcry in Berlin and Moscow, with 50,000 jobs at stake.