DAVOS, Jan 28: The annual Davos political and business summit started on Wednesday with new warnings over the gravity of the global recession and the impact of the damage already done.

The avalanche of bad news in recent months has turned this World Economic Forum into one of most gloomy held since the elite meetings at the Swiss mountain-top resort started nearly four decades ago.

Chinese and Russian premiers Wen Jiabao and Vladimir Putin took centre stage on the first day of the meeting as they were chosen to make keynote speeches.

Germany’s Chancellor Angela Merkel and the British and Japanese prime ministers Gordon Brown and Taro Aso —who have between them spent hundreds of billions of dollars battling the crisis — were also among about 40 heads of state or government who will speak this week.

But with much attention on US President Barack Obama’s efforts to get a 825 billion dollar stimulus package through Congress, grim predictions for the efforts made so far to repair the world economy were made as soon as debates started.

South Africa’s Finance Minister Trevor Manuel said wealthy nations appeared to be adopting a “lemming-like approach, trying to get to the precipice without knowing what their money would buy.” He said there was a real risk developed countries would come out of the crisis with massive debts.

“The crisis is getting worse,” said the News Corp media tycoon Rupert Murdoch. “It’s going to take drastic action to turn it around, if it can be turned around quickly. Personally, I believe it will take some time.”

He added: “The great majority of the people in the world are depressed and traumatised by the fact that their savings, the wealth in their homes or pension funds ... a big percentage of it has disappeared.”

Former UN secretary general Kofi Annan told reporters: “I believe we are facing three interrelated crises: a global recession, energy insecurity and climate change.”Stephen Green, chairman of HSBC bank, one of few high-profile financiers to attend, said: “There are no magic wands and even crystal balls are in short supply.”

Davos delegates were also seeing new signs that the battle against the worst recession since the Great Depression of the 1930s was becoming ever tougher.

Confidence among chief executives at more than 1,100 top companies around the world has “plummeted”, according to a survey by consultants PricewaterhouseCooper released in Davos.

“The speed and intensity of the recession has rocked the psyches of CEOs and created a global crisis of confidence,” commented PwC chief executive Samuel DiPiazza.

The main theme of the forum will be “Shaping the Post-Crisis World” and its founder Klaus Schwab said the crisis highlighted the need to reform financial institutions and systems.

“It is a call to remind us of the need to adjust our values to the needs of a world that rightly expects a much higher degree of responsibility and accountability,” he said.

The massive bank losses and layoffs on Wall Street and in the City of London will be reflected in the absence of key bankers who held high profile parties and receptions in earlier years at Davos.

John Thain, head of Merrill Lynch, which had to seek a takeover by Bank of America, resigned last week. Goldman Sachs, previously one of the social highlights of Davos, has called off its party this year.

The economic storm has overshadowed attempts to highlight other key issues ranging from conflict zones around the world and climate change to efforts to spread democracy and ease chronic Third World poverty and sex discrimination.—AFP