Lagarde: Critical US debt ceiling is raised

Failure to raise the US debt ceiling could damage the global economy, IMF chief Christine Lagarde has said.

“It is ‘mission-critical’ that this be resolved as soon as possible,” she said in Washington, ahead of next week’s IMF and World Bank annual meetings.

Republican and Democratic leaders in the US Congress so far remain at loggerheads over funding the government, keeping hundreds of thousands of federal employees off the job without pay for a third day yesterday.