OTTAWA — The Group of Seven powers turned up the heat on Japan as they gathered Friday in the snow-blanketed Canadian capital to fan faint sparks of recovery in the shaken world economy.
Fears that the ailing Japanese economy will smother a nascent global turnaround provided the backdrop as policymakers met over a lobster salad and veal dinner in the neo-Gothic Parliament building.
Braving freezing temperatures on the steps to the Parliament, about 60 young activists brandished banners reading, "G7, IMF, Bush: the real axis of evil" and "They are Enron, we are Argentina."