Washington (AFP) – The US central bank opened its policy meeting Tuesday, which is expected to produce a big rate hike as policymakers go on the attack against record high inflation. Following a quarter-point increase in the benchmark lending rate in March, Federal Reserve Chair Jerome Powell and other central bankers have said a half-point increase could be announced when the two-day meeting concludes Wednesday. The challenge for the policy-setting Federal Open Market Committee (FOMC) is to tame price pressures without tipping the world’s largest economy into a recession. The Fed is “behind t…