Less than one month after London's G20 summit aimed to pull the world out of recession, the world's top finance ministers descended on the US capital Friday to review their success, dpa reported. The United States and other countries are pointing to some signs that the global downturn may be slowing, even as the International Monetary Fund on Wednesday forecast a 1.3-per-cent contraction of the world economy in 2009, the one-year performance since World War II. US Treasury Secretary Timothy Geithner was hosting ministers and central bank heads from the world's 20 leading economies later Friday. He will hold a separate meeting with ministers from the seven wealthiest nations, known as the G7, whose financial sectors share most of the blame for starting the global downturn. The flurry of talks comes ahead of a broader gathering this weekend in Washington of the International Monetary Fund and World Bank's 185 members. Finance ministers are billing the meetings as a chance to take stock of the world's progress - or continued descent - since G20 leaders met on April 2 in London, where they agreed on a massive boost to the resources of international financial institutions. With the crisis spreading to all corners of the globe, the G20 has risen over the last six months from obscurity to become the top venue for governments to coordinate efforts to revive their economies.
