| |
 |
Visit aimed to renew bond
|
BRITISH Prime Minister Tony Blair left Washington on Saturday after a meeting with US President George W Bush in which both leaders were at pains to emphasize that the transatlantic relationship remained strong.
The day of meetings on Friday was the new US president's first encounter with Blair and his first with a European leader.
Officials on both sides had taken care to cast the meeting as the start of a promising friendship, despite Blair's centre-left sympathies and his warm relationship with Bush's Democratic predecessor, Bill Clinton.
Facing the press after their talks at the presidential retreat Camp David, outside Washington, the two leaders warned Iraq not to “cross a line", reassured each other over wider defence policies, and joked about their shared tastes in toothpaste.
“As they told me, he's a pretty charming guy," was Bush's opening. “He put the charm offensive on me. And it worked."
The US-British relationship faces possible tensions over US missile defence plans and any renewed trade disputes between the United States and the European Union.
But as the two leaders stood to face the press, dressed casually and with a log fire burning in a grate behind them, the encounter that one commentator had likened to a blind date seemed to have gone well.
“I can assure you that, when either of us gets in a bind, there will be a friend on the other end of the phone," Bush said.
The president said he had been reassured by Blair's promises that Europe's planned 60,000-strong rapid reaction force would not undermine Nato and would act only in limited roles, mainly for humanitarian or peacekeeping purposes.
“We would never do anything to undermine Nato," Blair said. The force was “an additional string to our bow" in circumstances where Nato might not want to intervene.
Blair stopped short of endorsing Bush's plan for national missile defence shield but said he shared US concerns about threats to world security.
On Iraq, they agreed Saddam Hussein had to be contained and the sanctions against Baghdad reviewed “to make them more effective", Bush said.
Bush told reporters on Friday he was confident the two leaders would enjoy a “strong and good personal relationship and an alliance that will stand the test of time".
(SD-Agencies)
|
|
|
|
