LOS CABOS (Mexico), June 18: Leaders of the world's major powers arrived in Mexico for the G20 summit on Monday hoping to buy the global economy some breathing space by boosting the IMF's firewall protecting debt-ridden states.

The heads of the 20 biggest economies welcomed Greek voters' decision to back parties that are committed to the terms of their EU and IMF-led bailout, but there was no respite for the struggling eurozone from the markets.

European leaders had hoped the Greek vote would send a signal that the single currency bloc is at last getting on top of its debt crisis, but attention turned to other fragile members and Spanish borrowing costs soared record levels.

Italian and Spanish stocks plunged and the euro fell against the dollar.

US President Barack Obama fears that the turmoil in Europe will drag down the broader world economy and damage his own hopes of re-election in November.

He was to meet EU leaders later in the day after the opening of the Los Cabos summit.

As he met summit host President Felipe Calderon, Obama said the world was “very concerned” about slowing economic growth and said leaders must make sure they do what is needed to stabilize the financial system.

The US leader said the summit should ensure “the economy grows, the situation stabilises, confidence returns to the markets and, most importantly we're giving our people the chance, if they work hard, to succeed and do well.”

All eyes will be on Germany's Chancellor Angela Merkel, but there was no sign she might soften her hardline stance on the austerity measures Europe imposed on indebted eurozone members, which some argue have sabotaged economic growth.

“Elections cannot call into question the commitments Greece made. We cannot compromise on the reform steps we agreed on,” Merkel told reporters on arrival in the Mexican beach resort of Los Cabos just ahead of the summit.

“We as Europeans will make clear in a common effort that we are tackling the growth problems in Europe decisively through a mixture of structural reforms, fiscal consolidation and stimulus for growth,” she added.

Merkel said that full details of the European plan would not be revealed until the European summit at the end of the month, but that she expected a “good” G20.

Meanwhile, the BRICS bloc of Brazil, Russia, India, China and South Africa were expected to pledge tens of billions of dollars in new loans to the IMF's pool of funds to protect vulnerable sovereign borrowers like Spain and Greece.

China's Vice Finance Minister Zhu Guangyao predicted the group would pledge at least $60 billion and thus boost the firewall.—AFP