G20 leaders gather to discuss crisis

World leaders have gathered in London to begin thrashing out a rescue package for
the global economy.
The G20 summit began on Thursday with leaders including Prime Minister Kevin Rudd,
US President Barack Obama and British Prime Minister Gordon Brown beginning talks
about tackling the worst financial crisis since the 1930s.
The talks followed a day of protests across London, with more than 4,000 people
taking to the streets in an outburst of anger over the handling of the global
economic crisis.
More than 80 people were arrested and one man died after a protest outside the Bank
of England descended into violence on Wednesday.
Police feared there could be more violence on Thursday, with further protests
planned around the London Stock Exchange and near the G20 summit at the ExCel
conference centre in the Docklands, in the city's east.
G20 leaders began the day with a working breakfast before nearly five hours of
formal talks were due to begin later in the morning.
On the agenda are new regulations for the finance industry, extra economic stimulus
packages, more money for the International Monetary Fund to help poorer countries, a
crackdown on tax havens and a $US100 billion boost for international trade.
The talks began amid clear warnings from France and Germany that unless their calls
for tougher regulations for the finance sector were backed by their G20
counterparts, they could walk away from a global economic rescue package.
French President Nicolas Sarkozy and German Chancellor Angela Merkel made their
demands clear at a last-minute joint press conference in London on the eve of the
summit.
The two leaders have repeatedly criticised calls by Britain and the US for G20
nations to increase government spending to drive an economic recovery.
Sarkozy and Merkel insist their governments have already introduced substantial
stimulus packages and there is a greater need for the finance industry to be subject
to tighter rules to prevent a repeat of the economic crisis gripping the globe.
Brown has played down divisions with the European leaders and expressed confidence
that a rescue deal can be struck.
But the French president, who had earlier threatened to walk out of the summit, told
reporters that tighter rules for tax havens, hedge funds and ratings agencies were a
"non-negotiable goal".
Companies found to break the new rules would effectively be named and shamed while
bankers' pay would be capped, under the Franco-German plan.
"In the results, we want the principle of new regulation to be a major objective ...
this is not negotiable," Sarkozy said, adding it was time to "moralise an immoral
system".
"We are just trying to take responsibility.
"This is a historic opportunity afforded us to give capitalism a conscience, because
capitalism has lost its conscience and we have to seize this opportunity."
Merkel said France and Germany wanted the summit to produce results which would
"change the world".
"Any regulations we don't agree here, won't be agreed for the next five years," she
said.
"The summit is not about horse trading between regulation and economic growth
programs."
Brown expressed confidence that agreement would be struck on regulation, boosting
global trade and job creation.
"We are within a few hours, I think, of agreeing a global plan for economic recovery
and reform and I think the significance of this is that we are looking at every
aspect," Brown said.
Obama said it was vital all countries worked together to resolve the economic crisis.
"Make no mistake, we are facing the most severe economic crisis since World War II,
and the global economy is now so fundamentally interlinked that we can only meet
this challenge together," he said.