Secretary of State John Kerry urges US Congress to end shutdown

Jakarta, Oct 6: US Secretary of State John Kerry urged the Congress to end a partial government shutdown and assured the international community that the budget impasse will be resolved shortly.

Kerry Saturday said it was regrettable that a small group in Congress - Tea Party Republicans in the House of Representatives - was preventing US President Barack Obama from meeting with his Chinese and Russian counterparts at the Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation (APEC) forum in Bali, Indonesia.

The secretary of state was standing in at that gathering for Obama, who cancelled his trip due to the budget standoff.

"All of our friends and foes watching around the world should not mistake this momentary episode in American politics as anything more than that," Kerry said.

The partial suspension of federal government operations, which began at midnight Monday, was spurred by the unwillingness of some House Republicans to vote to fund the government unless Obama and the Democrats agreed to delay implementation of the Affordable Care Act.

The Act, also known as Obamacare, is the administration's flagship domestic initiative and the president refused to consider any changes or delays.

The two-day APEC forum, which will get under way Monday, is a gathering attended by representatives of 21 pacific rim countries - Australia, Brunei, Canada, Chile, China, Hong Kong, Indonesia, Japan, Malaysia, Mexico, New Zealand, Papua New Guinea, Peru, the Philippines, Russia, Singapore, South Korea, Thailand, Taiwan, the US and Vietnam.

IANS