Merkel to Host Trichet, Lagarde, Baroin in Debt-Crisis Talks

German Chancellor Angela Merkel will host European Central Bank President Jean-Claude Trichet and International Monetary Fund chief Christine Lagarde Oct. 6 as pressure mounts to stem the euro-region debt crisis.

The U.S. and Canada were among Group of 20 nations that last week urged euro-area leaders to act to prevent the crisis that began in Greece from denting the global economy.

Merkel would “do well to gather international advice to find ways out of this crisis, showing that Germany is cognizant of its wider impact,” Holger Schmieding, chief economist of Berenberg Bank in London, said in an interview. “The debt crisis is at a critical phase, further fiscal resources to combat the crisis are scant and Merkel needs to tell international leaders she will use what’s available efficiently.”

German Finance Minister Wolfgang Schaeuble, French Finance Minister Francois Baroin and Angel Gurria, secretary general of the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development, will participate in the talks, which also include World Bank President Robert Zoellick.

The Berlin talks precede an Oct. 14-15 meeting of G-20 finance ministers in Paris. That gathering will be followed by a summit of European Union leaders on Oct. 17-18. G-20 leaders descend on Cannes, France Nov. 3-4.

U.S. President Barack Obama this week joined a chorus that includes Treasury Secretary Timothy Geithner and Lagarde in urging European governments to go further and show more urgency in tackling the crisis. Bank of Canada Governor Mark Carney has said the rescue fund, called the European Financial Stability Facility, should be topped up to 1 trillion euros ($1.4 trillion) from 440 billion euros currently.

Europeans haven’t responded “as effectively as they needed to,” Obama said during a roundtable discussion at the White House on Sept. 28.

Schaeuble rejected as “nonsense” proposals from the European Commission that the firepower of the rescue fund needs to be boosted.