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China remains confident Europe can solve its crippling debt crisis even though it continues to balk at requests for it to use its financial firepower.

President Hu Jintao told reporters Monday his country is closely following developments in Europe as the 17 countries that use the euro grapple with a debt crisis that has seen three countries bailed out and threatening to engulf Italy, the eurozone’s third largest economy .

“We are convinced that Europe has the wisdom and the competence to conquer its momentary difficulties,” he said during an official visit to Austria.

Europe is closely watching comments by Hu and other Chinese officials in the hope the country will use some of its huge cash reserves to help prevent the region’s debt crisis from spilling over into increasingly shaky economies like Italy and Spain.

Beijing so far has promised to help only by continuing business as usual, trading with Europe and stockpiling some of China’s multibillion-dollar trade surpluses in the safest European government bonds.

Eurozone leaders last week presented the broad outlines of a new anti-crisis strategy. At the center of this strategy is an expansion of the eurozone’s bailout fund, the European Financial Stability Facility. Since the currency union’s finances are already stretched, it wants non-European investors to help fund a special investment vehicle that would act alongside the EFSF.

Although many details of that plan have still to be agreed, this investment vehicle could help the EFSF buy up bonds from struggling countries like Italy and Spain or support bank recapitalizations in poorer eurozone countries payday loans.

Getting more resources behind Europe’s main anti-crisis weapon is particularly important if market pressures continue to rise on Italy. On Friday, Rome had to pay record interest rates at a bond auction, indicating that it may soon have to request help from the eurozone to keep its funding costs in check.

No signs of more direct Chinese plans to help have emerged during Hu’s visit, which started Sunday and ends in two days, when he flies to the G-20 summit in Cannes, France for talks expected to focus on the eurozone’s crisis.

Instead, Hu suggested Monday that China remained content to let European Union leaders work on a solution.

Hu, who did not take questions, said he believes that the path to a global upswing lies on greater cooperation among the world’s leading economies.

Hu has been courted by major EU countries as the financial crisis unfolds.

He and French President Nicolas Sarkozy talked Thursday by phone and pledged to cooperate to revive global growth, while the chief executive of the EU’s bailout fund visited Beijing on Friday to talk to potential investors.

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Nixon touts trade deal

France’s president says the European Union will force banks to raise their capital to higher levels already by 2012 rather than 2019.

Nicolas Sarkozy said Sunday the capital buffers banks have to achieve under the Basel III rules will already be obligatory for big EU banks as of next year.

He did not say how much money banks will have to raise as a result. He was speaking after a summit of the 27 EU leaders.

The Basel III rules require banks to have a capital ratio of 9 percent of risky assets. That is much higher than the 5 percent they needed to pass EU stress tests this summer.

A European official said Saturday that would force banks to raise just over euro100 billion ($137.98 billion).

THIS IS A BREAKING NEWS UPDATE. Check back soon for further information. AP’s earlier story is below.

BRUSSELS (AP) _ Greece’s prime minister pleaded Sunday for a comprehensive solution to the European debt crisis that has swallowed his country and is threatening to suck in larger economies, but the continent’s leaders warned the world may have to wait a few more days.

The search for a comprehensive solution to its escalating debt troubles has divided the continent. Increasingly it is pitting not only the poorer countries in the eurozone against their richer neighbors that are tired of bailing them out, but also sparking anger from governments outside the 17-state currency union, who fear being dragged into the mess.

“The crisis in the eurozone is having a chilling effect on all our economies, Britain included. … We have to deal with this issue,” British Prime Minister David Cameron said on his way into the meeting of the 27-country EU. Britain does not use the euro. Later in the day, the leaders of countries the 17 that use the euro will meet on their own.

Cameron’s eurozone counterparts, meanwhile, tried to lower expectations for Sunday’s meetings, saying the real decisions will be made Wednesday at another emergency summit.

“Let’s put the expectations in context: Don’t count on decisions today,” German Chancellor Angela Merkel said.

Leaders are in the difficult position of not being able to decide on anything until everything is in place, since each piece of the crisis puzzle affects the others.

The biggest sticking point is how to most effectively use Europe’s bailout fund to make sure Italy and Spain don’t see their borrowing costs spiral out of control as happened with Greece, Portugal and Ireland. Europe doesn’t have enough money to rescue Italy and Spain as it did the other three countries; analysts say it must act now to eliminate the possibility of their collapse.

Merkel and French President Nicolas Sarkozy urged Italian Prime Minister Silvio Berlusconi at a meeting on Sunday morning to reform the country’s economy before it’s too late, according to a German official. He spoke on condition of anonymity to describe private discussions.

While the German and French leaders presented a united front to Italy, their disagreements over how best to use the bailout fund, which is called the European Financial Stability Facility, are causing delays.

France wants the fund to be allowed to tap the massive cash reserves of the European Central Bank _ an option Germany rejects. And weaker economies are wary of agreeing to the other two parts of the grand plan _ bigger bank capital and cuts to Greece’s debt _ without assurance that the bailout fund is ready to provide support.

Until it does, the continuing uncertainty will roil markets and slow growth across Europe and even the world.

Worst off, of course, is Greece, which reeling from several rounds of budget cuts that have sparked a series of strikes and riots.

“Greece has proven again and again that we are making the necessary decisions to make our economy sustainable, and make our economy more just,” Greek Prime Minister George Papandreou told reporters as he headed into Sunday’s meetings. “We are doing what we need from our side … but it’s been proven now that the crisis is not a Greek crisis. The crisis is a European crisis, so now is the time that we as Europeans need to act decisively and effectively.”

To ease the pressure on the country, banks will be asked to accept much bigger losses on the country’s bonds.

Austria’s chancellor said the cut in the value of Greek government bond will likely be raised “in the direction of 40 to 50 percent.”

“A cut in the debt is the right step,” Werner Faymann told Austrian newspaper Wiener Kurier. The comments were confirmed by one of his aides.

Despite massive budget cuts and reforms, a new report has said that Greece’s economic situation is still dire and that worsening economic conditions mean it could take the country decades to emerge from the crisis.

The report from debt inspectors said the eurozone and the International Monetary Fund would likely have to lend Athens more money unless the banks accept a 60 percent writedown of the bonds they hold. That would be on top of the euro110 billion ($300 billion) in rescue loans that have been propping up with country since May 2010.

Another rescue of a similar size was agreed to in July, but it’s now clear that deal did not go far enough. For instance, it called for only a 21 percent cut in Greek bond holdings; leaders are now discussing a much more significant reduction, though an exact percentage has not yet emerged.

The near-consensus among eurozone countries that Greece’s debt will have to be slashed is one of the reasons banks across Europe _ not only in the 17-country eurozone _ will be forced to shore up their capital buffers in the coming months.

A European official said Saturday that new rules agreed by EU finance ministers would see banks having to raise just over euro100 billion ($140 billion). The official was speaking on condition of anonymity because the rules were pending approval from EU leaders.

However, on Sunday it was uncertain whether EU leaders would even be able to sign off on the bank capital rules before a second summit Wednesday. A draft of summit conclusions from Sunday morning only welcomed the progress made by finance ministers, adding that the final decision would be made by yet another finance ministers’ meeting on Wednesday ahead of the second summit.

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Greeks furious at the government’s austerity measures are vowing to turn out in force on the streets of Athens on the second day of a general strike, as lawmakers vote on the intensely unpopular new measures needed to secure continued payment from an international bailout fund.

Unions plan demonstrations, with one intending to encircle parliament in an attempt to prevent lawmakers getting into the building for the vote. On Wednesday, riots broke out during a protest march by more than 100,000 people.

The austerity bill won initial approval with a majority vote Wednesday, and lawmakers now vote on the details.

The measures include the suspension on reduced pay of 30,000 public servants and the suspension of collective labor contracts, and have angered even deputies from the governing Socialist party.

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The Occupy Wall Street movement has close to $300,000, as well as storage space loaded with donated supplies in lower Manhattan. It stared down city officials to hang on to its makeshift headquarters, showed its muscle Saturday with a big Times Square demonstration and found legions of activists demonstrating in solidarity across the country and around the world.

Could this be the peak for loosely organized protesters, united less by a common cause than by revulsion to what they consider unbridled corporate greed? Or are they just getting started?

There are signs of confidence, but also signs of tension among the demonstrators at Zuccotti Park, the epicenter of the movement that began a month ago Monday. They have trouble agreeing on things like whether someone can bring in a sleeping bag, and show little sign of uniting on any policy issues. Some protesters eventually want the movement to rally around a goal, while others insist that isn’t the point.

“We’re moving fast, without a hierarchical structure and lots of gears turning,” said Justin Strekal, a college student and political organizer who traveled from Cleveland to New York to help. “… Egos are clashing, but this is participatory democracy in a little park.”

Even if the protesters were barred from camping in Zuccotti Park, as the property owner and the city briefly threatened to do last week, the movement would continue, Strekal said. He said activists were working with legal experts to identify alternate sites where the risk of getting kicked out would be relatively low.

Wall Street protesters are intent on hanging on to the momentum they gained from Saturday’s worldwide demonstrations, which drew hundreds of thousands of people, mostly in the U.S. and Europe. They’re filling a cavernous space a block from Wall Street with donated goods to help sustain their nearly month-long occupation of a private park nearby.

They’ve amassed mounds of blankets, pillows, sleeping bags, cans of food, medical and hygienic supplies _ even oddities like a box of knitting wool and 20 pairs of swimming goggles (to shield protesters from pepper-spray attacks). Supporters are shipping about 300 boxes a day, Strekal said.

The space was donated by the United Federation of Teachers, which has offices in the building.

Close to $300,000 in cash also has been donated, through the movement’s website and by people who give money in person at the park, said Bill Dobbs, a press liaison for the movement. The movement has an account at Amalgamated Bank, which bills itself as “the only 100 percent union-owned bank in the United States.”

Strekal said the donated goods are being stored “for a long-term occupation.”

“We are unstoppable! Another world is possible!” Kara Segal and other volunteers chanted in the building lobby as they arrived to help unpack and sort items, preparing them to be rolled out to the park.

While on the streets, moments of madness occasionally erupt in the protest crowd _ accompanied by whiffs of marijuana, grungy clothing and disarray _ order prevails at the storage site.

It doubles as a sort of Occupy Wall Street central command post, with strategic meetings that are separate from the “general assembly” free-for-alls in the park. One subject Sunday was data entry: protesters are working to get the names and addresses of donors into a databank.

The movement has become an issue in the Republican presidential primary race and beyond, with politicians from both parties under pressure to weigh in.

President Barack Obama referred to the protests at Sunday’s dedication of a monument for Martin Luther King Jr., saying the civil rights leader “would want us to challenge the excesses of Wall Street without demonizing those who work there.”

Many of the largest of Saturday’s protests were in Europe, where protesters involved in long-running demonstrations against austerity measures declared common cause with the Occupy Wall Street movement. In Rome, hundreds of rioters infiltrated a march by tens of thousands of demonstrators, causing what the mayor estimated was at least euro1 million ($1.4 million) in damage to city property.

U.S. cities large and small were “occupied” over the weekend: Washington, D.C., Fairbanks, Alaska, Burlington, Vt., Rapid City, S.D., and Cheyenne, Wyo. were just a few. In Cincinnati, protesters moved their demonstration out of a park after hearing that a couple was getting their wedding photos taken there _ but the bride and groom ended up seeking them out for pictures.

More than 70 New York protesters were arrested Saturday, more than 40 of them in Times Square. About 175 people were arrested in Chicago after they refused to leave a park where they were camped late Saturday, and there were about 100 arrests in Arizona _ 53 in Tucson and 46 in Phoenix _ after protesters refused police orders to disperse. About two dozen people were arrested in Denver, and in Sacramento, Calif., anti-war activist Cindy Sheehan was among about 20 people arrested after failing to follow police orders to disperse.

Activists around the country said they felt that Saturday’s protests energized their movement.

“It’s an upward trajectory,” said John St. Lawrence, a Florida real estate lawyer who took part in Saturday’s Occupy Orlando protest, which drew more than 1,500 people. “It’s catching people’s imagination and also, knock on wood, nothing sort of negative or discrediting has happened.”

St. Lawrence is among those unconcerned that the movement has not rallied around any particular proposal, saying “policy is for leaders to come up with.”

“I don’t think the underlying theme is a mystery,” he said. “We saw what the banks and financial institutions did to the economy. We bailed them out. And then they went about evicting people from their homes,” he said. He added that although he is not in debt and owns his own home, other people in his neighborhood are suffering and “everyone’s interests are interconnected.”

In Richmond, Va., about 75 people gathered Sunday for one of the “general assembly” meetings that are a key part of the movement’s consensus-building process. Protester Whitney Whiting, a video editor, said the process has helped “gather voices” about Americans discontent, and that she expects it will eventually take the movement a step further.

“In regards to a singular issue or a singular focus, I think that will come eventually. But right now we have to set up a space for that to happen,” Whiting said.

Some U.S. protesters, like those in Europe, have their own causes. Unions that have joined forces with the movement have demands of their own, and on Sunday members of the newly formed Occupy Pittsburgh group demanded that Bank of New York Mellon Corp. pay back money they allege it overcharged public pension funds around the country.

New York’s attorney general and New York City sued BNY Mellon this month, accusing it of defrauding clients in foreign currency exchange transactions that generated nearly $2 billion over 10 years. The company has vowed to fight the lawsuit and had no comment about the protesters’ allegation about pensions.

Lisa Deaton, a tea party leader from southern Indiana, said she sees some similarities between how the tea party movement and the Wall Street protests began: “We got up and we wanted to vent.”

But the critical step, she said, was taking that emotion and focusing it toward changing government.

The first rally she organized drew more than 2,500 people, but afterward, “it was like, `What do we do?’” she said. “You can’t have a concert every weekend.”

The Wall Street protesters’ lack of leadership and focus on consensus-building has help bring together people with different perspectives, but it’s also created some tension.

“Issues are arising _ like who is bringing in sleeping bags without permission,” said Laurie Dobson, who’s been helping a self-governed “working group” called “SIS” _ for Shipping, Inventory and Supplies.

Sleeping bags were among items cited by Zuccotti Park’s owner, Brookfield Properties, as not allowed on the premises _ along with tents, tarps and other essentials for the encampment. By Sunday, all those items were back.

Strekal didn’t see that as a problem. Protesters could do it, he said, “because we’re winning the PR war.”

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Mexican authorities on Thursday raised to six the death toll from Hurricane Jova, which hit along the Pacific coast as a Category 2 storm, and warned the storm’s remnants could affect opening ceremonies of the Pan American Games.

The body of a man who apparently had been swept away by a river current was found covered with mud in the town of Cihuatlan in Jalisco state, said civil protection spokesman Juan Pablo Vigueras. The games are scheduled to open in Jalisco on Friday.

The five other victims drowned, were killed by mudslides or died in a collapsed house.

Rain from the remnants of Jova may change the open-air inauguration of the Pan American Games in the western city of Guadalajara, said Bernardo de la Garza, Mexico’s top sports official.

Heavy rain falling on Mexico’s west coast also may affect training sessions for the games’ triathlon, sailing and beach volleyball, he said. All three competitions are to be held in the beach resort of Puerto Vallarta just north of where Jova hit land early Wednesday.

Farther south, a low-pressure system continued to dump rain on southern Mexico and Central America, where it was blamed for the deaths of 15 people in Guatemala. Rains will likely continue during the next couple days as the system hovers over southeastern Mexico, Guatemala and El Salvador, said the National Hurricane Center in Miami, Florida.

Guatemalan Vice President Rafael Espada said four people are missing.

He urged Guatemalans on Thursday to use the country’s highways only for emergencies, saying several were damaged by the storm or are blocked by mudslides.

The storm damaged at least 2,000 homes, said Alejandro Maldonado, director of Guatemala’s disaster prevention agency.

Meanwhile, Tropical Depression Irwin was expected to weaken as it swirled over the Pacific off Mexico’s coast and was forecast to become a remnant low within 24 hours, the hurricane center said.

Irwin’s maximum sustained winds Thursday afternoon were near 40 mph (65 kph). The storm was centered about 145 miles (235 kilometers) west of Manzanillo, Mexico, and was moving east at 6 mph (9 kph).

The depression’s was predicted to begin curving away from Mexico by Friday morning and head back out over the Pacific.

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Union leaders from Chrysler facilities around the country assembled in a Detroit suburb Monday expecting to hear details of a new four-year contract with the company. Instead, they were told to wait for a couple of days.

UAW spokeswoman Michele Martin said Monday that no agreement has been reached, and that bargaining will resume on Tuesday morning. Neither the union nor the company would say what’s holding up a deal.

Union leaders from outside Detroit were told at the meeting to stay in town for another meeting that’s scheduled for Wednesday, a sign that both sides are close to an agreement. But it was unusual for the UAW to hold the meeting on Monday without having a deal, and it indicates that the talks are snagged on money issues.

UAW President Bob King and Vice President General Holiefield had little to say to about 200 local leaders Monday at a regional UAW office in Warren, Mich., said one official who attended the meeting.

Neither King nor Holiefield talked about sticking points in the talks at Chrysler, the last of the Detroit automakers without an agreement with the union. The two spoke for a short time and said they were not ready to recommend a deal to the membership, said the official, who asked not to be identified because the meeting was private.

“The introductions were longer than the meeting,” the official said.

Workers at General Motors Co. approved a new contract late last month. Voting is under way at Ford Motor Co. At both companies, the union agreed to forego annual pay raises for most workers in favor of profit-sharing checks and signing bonuses. The companies held their labor costs steady but promised thousands of new union jobs.

Talks with the UAW are closely watched because they set the pay and benefits for 112,000 auto workers nationwide, and they set the bar for pay at auto parts suppliers and other manufacturers.

Bargaining continued with Chrysler through the weekend and into Monday morning over money issues, spokeswomen for both sides said. All the non-money issues have been settled for several days.

Sergio Marchionne, CEO of Chrysler and Italian automaker Fiat SpA, said Friday that the GM and Ford deals may be too rich for Chrysler. The company, unlike GM and Ford, lost money during the first half of the year.

Marchionne said he hopes a new deal can be reached without resorting to binding arbitration. Chrysler workers gave up the right to strike over wages under the terms of its 2009 government bailout. But either side in contract talks can take disputes to an arbitrator.

On Friday, the union and Chrysler were hung up on how many workers would be paid entry-level wages and the size of signing bonuses and profit-sharing checks, the local union official said.

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Greek Prime Minister George Papandreou has promised at a German industry forum that his country will live up to all the commitments it has made in the debt crisis.

A potentially disastrous debt default looms just weeks away for Greece. It needs to convince its rescue creditors, including Germany, that it is enforcing its reforms to access the loans needed to avoid bankruptcy in mid-October.

The prime minister said Tuesday: “I can guarantee that Greece will live up to all its commitments.” He promised that Greeks will “fight our way back to growth and prosperity.”

Ahead of a meeting Tuesday with Chancellor Angela Merkel, Papandreou called for Europe to unite and show it has a grip on the crisis.

He warned against heaping “only punishment and scorn” on his compatriots.

THIS IS A BREAKING NEWS UPDATE. Check back soon for further information. AP’s earlier story is below.

BERLIN (AP) _ Greek Prime Minister George Papandreou says his debt-ridden country has “great potential” and can emerge from its deep economic and financial crisis easy to get unsecured personal loans.

As a potentially disastrous debt default looms just weeks away for Greece, Papandreou said Tuesday at a conference of the Federation of German Industries that “we are borrowing to repay.”

Papandreou will meet later Tuesday with Chancellor Angela Merkel. Greece’s international creditors are pressing Athens to implement fully austerity measures. Without the next batch of loans, Greece would default in mid-October.

The prime minister outlined Greece’s efforts to enforce reforms agreed in exchange for the loans.

He said that “so many people in Greece ask me, is all the pain worthwhile, can we make it? … my answer is, yes we can.”

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Stock futures are plummeting after the Federal Reserve indicated the U.S. economic slump could last for years.

The Fed took steps to stimulate the economy Wednesday that had largely been expected. But investors were troubled because the central bank’s statement showed it expected a deep and persistent downturn.

A government report Thursday morning on new claims for unemployment benefits will give traders news on the country’s jobs crisis _ one of the major economic challenges cited by the Fed.

Ninety minutes before the opening bell, Dow Jones industrial average futures are down 211 points, or 1.9 percent, at 10,796. Standard & Poor’s 500 index futures are down 24, or 2.1 percent, at 1,131. Nasdaq 100 futures are down 43, or 1.9 percent, at 2,202.

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It looks like the United Auto Workers union and General Motors Co. are nearing an agreement on a new contract.

UAW Vice President Joe Ashton, the union’s chief negotiator, told workers in an email update Friday that bargainers are getting “very close” to the framework of a deal.

“I am optimistic that the negotiations process is entering its final stage,” Ashton wrote. “I truly believe that a settlement is within reach.”

But Ashton also cautioned that both sides still need to do more work, saying that agreements of this size undergo many revisions before they are final.

Contract talks between the union and GM, Chrysler Group LLC and Ford Motor Co. began in July and will determine wages and benefits for factory workers at all three companies. They will also set the bar for wages at auto parts companies, U.S. factories run by foreign automakers and other manufacturers, which employ hundreds of thousands of people. The talks are the first since GM and Chrysler needed government aid to make it through bankruptcy protection in 2009.

Workers at all three companies have stayed on the job under terms of a contract that expired Wednesday night. Workers at GM and Chrysler cannot strike over wages under the terms of the companies’ 2009 government bailouts. Ford workers can still strike. Each company negotiates with the union separately.

Negotiators with GM and the union bargained until around 9 p.m. Thursday and resumed talks on Friday morning.

“We continue to make progress in negotiations,” GM spokeswoman Kim Carpenter said, declining further comment.

The union is seeking bigger profit-sharing checks, guarantees of more jobs, signing bonuses and raises for entry-level workers. Ford and GM want to cut their hourly labor costs, which still are higher than Asian automakers with U.S. factories. Chrysler is trying to hold its costs steady.

Talks with Chrysler and Ford also are continuing, but have slowed as the union concentrates on GM. Any deal with GM would be used as a template for the other two companies, although unlike past years, there will be differences to match each company’s finances.

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