WASHINGTON - US lawmakers were scrambling on Thursday to avert a disastrous early August debt default, after President Barack Obama met separately with his top Democratic allies and Republican foes to hammer out a compromise.

But the negotiations wrapped up on Wednesday without news of a breakthrough.

With an Aug 2 deadline looming, White House spokesman Jay Carney said Obama would accept a short-term deal to raise the debt ceiling but only to buy time as part of a broader arrangement to slash the ballooning US deficit.

"We would not support a short-term extension" unless "a few days" are needed for a bill to work its way through the legislative process, said Carney.

The president in the past had rejected short-term measures, insisting on raising the $14.3 trillion US debt limit by enough to avoid another politically painful vote before his November 2012 re-election bid.

Obama met Democratic Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid and House Democratic Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi, and then Republican House Speaker John Boehner and Republican House Majority Leader Eric Cantor.

"We need to meet, talk, consult, narrow down what our options are and figure out, in fairly short order, you know, which train we're riding into the station," Carney said before the discussions.

"There is still time to do something significant if all parties are willing to compromise" on a "balanced" approach, he said, using Obama's term for a broad deal coupling spending cuts, including on social safety net programs dear to Democrats, with tax hikes on the rich, which Republicans have thus far opposed.

Washington hit its debt ceiling on May 16 and has used spending and accounting adjustments, as well as higher-than-expected tax receipts, to pay its bills and continue operating normally, but can only do so until Aug 2.

Finance and business leaders have warned failure to raise the US debt ceiling by then could send shock waves through a world economy still reeling from the 2008 collapse, while Obama has predicted a default would trigger economic "Armageddon".

"My expectation is that we're going to get it solved," Obama told a Missouri television station, KMBC, saying he saw hopeful signs of compromise and adding "over the next couple of weeks, hopefully we'll put this behind us".

Agence France-Presse

(China Daily 07/22/2011 page11)