Financial leaders from the world's leading industrial and developing countries arrive in Paris for the G20 meeting.
They gather at a time when there are fears that Europe's debt crisis could spin out of control and throw the global economy back into recession.
Participants arrive for a session that is expected to be dominated by the euro zone crisis and worries that a default by Greece could rapidly contaminate other countries in Europe and beyond.
French and German officials are trying to put flesh on the bones of a crisis resolution plan in time for a European Union summit on Oct. 23.
There are also parallel discussions taking place on the need to give the International Monetary Fund more firepower.
Fears of a default by Greece have pummeled markets with global stocks falling 17 percent from their 2011 high in May.
Unlike in 2009 when the G20 launched co-ordinated stimulus to pull the world out of crisis, the rest of the world is chafing at Europe's slow response while Washington and Beijing are sparring over the yuan currency.
A Franco-German crisis plan is likely to ask banks to accept bigger losses on their Greek debt.
It should also lay out a system for recapitalising banks and plans to leverage the euro zone's European Financial Stability Facility to give it more punch.
Deborah Lutterbeck, Reuters
