When the world's leading financial barons meet in Sicily this weekend [Feb 16, 2001] to review their armoury for spurring the global economy, they will do so at a site chosen as a strategic look-out point dating back more than 2,000 years. Finance ministers and central bank governors of the Group of Seven (G7) nations gather in Palermo, Sicily, on Saturday for a one-day meeting in the majestic 12th century Palazzo dei Normanni, built over the ruins of an ancient Roman fortress.

With centuries of