Leaders of the 15-nation eurozone say Sunday's Paris summit will be an attempt to establish a common response to the global financial crisis.

French Finance Minister Christine Lagarde said the meeting would follow up and execute upon a five-point plan agreed to in Washington Friday by the Group of Seven industrialized nations, the BBC reported.

Lagarde said the Paris summit would put meat on the plan's skeleton. The meeting comes a day after the International Monetary Fund warned that the world's international financial system was on the brink of collapse as stock and credit markets were gripped by panic.

French President Nicolas Sarkozy and German Chancellor Angela Merkel met Saturday in Paris and dampened hopes the summit could produce a common European financial rescue fund. Both leaders rejected the plan citing significant differences between member nations' banking systems.

But they did say they would present other proposals to ease the credit crunch that has precipitated the collapse of several major international banks, the BBC said.

Copyright 2008 by United Press International


Publication date: 12 October 2008   

Source: UPI-1-20081012-11354800-bc-eu-banking.xml

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