CANNES, France — Europe failed to get the leaders of the world’s wealthiest economies to help out with its debt troubles, but everyone left a Group of Twenty summit Friday relieved that at least they forced the Greek prime minister not to hold the world hostage with a bailout vote.
It took a public berating of Greek Prime Minister George Papandreou, and Greece’s politics are in upheaval as a result, but the shaky bailout plan appears back on track for now.
Investors had been hoping the G20 nations would lend the struggling eurozone a helping hand — but the G20 leaders said Europe needs to help itself first. They said the International Monetary Fund could be beefed up to help more, but not for at least three more months.
The debt crisis that rocked the 17-nation currency union for the past two years has reached a new high and now threatens to push the world economy into a second recession.
Conceding a fragile global recovery and plodding job growth back home, President Barack Obama said Friday that he is confident European leaders are fixing their ominous debt crisis, which threatens to undermine the United States and his own shot at a second term.
The president capped his role at a brisk G20 summit essentially where he started it, offering solidarity to his European peers with signals it was their responsibility to clean up the economic mess in their own backyards.
“I am confident that Europe has the capacity to meet this challenge,” Obama said in a news conference.
