Washington ? World financial leaders pledged Sunday to do everything possible to prevent stock market turmoil from derailing an uncertain global recovery and committed themselves to meeting an April deadline for unveiling a dramatic new approach for handling bankrupt nations.

IMF Managing Director Horst Koehler said the agreement to move the bankruptcy proposal forward was a major achievement for this year’s annual meetings of the 184-nation IMF and its sister lending organization, the World Bank.

“This is a kind of breakthrough. … There is a recognition that there is a gap in the international financial architecture,” Koehler told a concluding news conference.

Delegates on Sunday approved a recommendation that the IMF staff develop for consideration by April a fully developed approach for allowing countries with unsustainable debt burdens to essentially declare bankruptcy and force creditors to negotiate more lenient repayment terms.

Protesters had sought to disrupt this year’s discussions by shutting down the capital. Their efforts fizzled in the face of poor turnout and an overwhelming police presence.

Police prepared for as many as 20,000 demonstrators, but a much smaller number of mostly peaceful protesters used puppets and banners to display their unhappiness with global capitalism.

Koehler and World Bank President James Wolfensohn said the protesters failed to appreciate the extensive reforms both institutions have undertaken to better respond to the needs of poor countries.

But both officials acknowledged that much more needed to be done to narrow the gap between rich and poor nations; 15 percent of the world’s population controls 80 percent of the income.

“The quest for a more equal world is the quest for long-term peace something that military power alone can never achieve,” Wolfensohn said.

At the concluding news conference, Wolfensohn ticked off a range of initiatives the World Bank has under way to improve drinking water in poor nations, educate millions of children not now in school and combat AIDS.

“We have to stop philosophizing and get on with the tasks,” Wolfensohn said.

Finance officials said the sluggish economy is making harder their job of promoting prosperity. The stock market declines, economic turmoil in Latin America and anxiety about possible war in Iraq have contributed to the weaker than expected recovery.

Protesters contended the IMF and World Bank were woefully short in commitments to helping poor countries. But officials of the two institutions said they were on track to achieve their part of the U.N. goal of cutting in half by 2015 the number of people in poverty.

Both Koehler and Wolfensohn urged rich nations to make their markets more open to farm goods and other products from poor nations.