Tuning in to Europe

President Bush has shown EU leaders he is ready to listen, but are they saying what he wants to hear, asks Denis Staunton

President Bush has shown EU leaders he is ready to listen, but are they saying what he wants to hear, asks Denis Staunton

At NATO headquarters in Brussels on Tuesday morning, President George W. Bush walked over to the Spanish prime minister, José Luis Rodriguez Zapatero, and shook his hand.

"Hola! Que tal, amigo?" (Hi! How are you, my friend?) the president said.

"Muy bien, y tu?" (Very well, and yourself?) replied the prime minister.

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The entire exchange lasted less than seven seconds but Zapatero's aides regarded it as so significant that they rushed out to report it to the Spanish media.

Zapatero angered the US last year when, as soon as he became prime minister, he withdrew all his country's soldiers from Iraq. But here was a sign that Bush was ready to put the rancour of the past behind them.

The US president's four-day visit to Europe this week was full of such gestures of reconciliation towards the Iraq war's most outspoken European critics. On Monday evening, Bush hosted a dinner for the French president, Jacques Chirac, and on Wednesday, he travelled to Germany as the guest of the chancellor, Gerhard Schröder.

When the Taoiseach emerged from a meeting of EU leaders with Bush on Tuesday afternoon, he rhapsodised about the president's new, conciliatory tone. Bertie Ahern said the meeting could not have been more different from an EU-US summit four years ago, when Bush laid down the law to the Europeans on the Kyoto protocol on climate change.

"He came in and said: This is our position on Kyoto. We're against it. Forget it. We're not part of it. Good luck to youse now, lads. Que sera," Ahern recalled. "Today, it was the opposite: Listen, we're here, we have problems, we have difficulties and we have to get solutions. It's a difference in style, a difference in emphasis."

The Taoiseach was impressed by Bush's grasp of the issues he discussed with the Europeans, an impression that was shared by participants at a dinner with the US president at the European Commission headquarters later that evening.

"He was very well briefed. He knew the issues, knew the nuances, knew the sensitivities. A very, very good performance," Ahern said.

THE VISIT WAS not without its tense moments, however, starting with Bush's speech on Monday to "the peoples of Europe" when European dignitaries appeared to shift uncomfortably in their seats each time the president mentioned the words "freedom" and "democracy".

At NATO the following morning, Chirac backed Schröder's call for an overhaul of the transatlantic relationship that would enhance the status of the EU at NATO's expense.

Bush's appeal to NATO for more help in training Iraqi security forces drew a modest response, with France offering just one soldier, who will be based at NATO's Brussels headquarters.

When Bush returned to Washington on Thursday, Europe and America remained divided on the future of NATO, the best way to stop Iran developing nuclear weapons and the EU's move to lift its arms embargo on China.

There were signs, however, that the two sides had moved closer on a number of issues and that Bush had accomplished his mission of letting Europe know he is prepared to listen. On Iran, Bush described talk of a US military attack as "simply ridiculous", although he added that "all options remain on the table". He refused to join the European diplomatic effort to persuade Iran to abandon nuclear weapons technology in return for economic and security incentives.

In the Slovak capital of Bratislava on Thursday, however, Bush suggested that the three EU countries leading the talks with Iran could represent the US and NATO as well as the 25 EU member-states.

"The most effective way to achieve that goal is to have our partners - Great Britain and France and Germany - represent not only the EU, not only NATO, but the US," he said.

Bush repeated his opposition to European plans to lift the arms embargo on China that was imposed in 1989 after the Tiananmen Square massacre of student protesters. But he said he would consider European efforts to address US concerns about the move by adopting a tougher EU code of conduct on arms sales.

Despite France's meagre contribution to NATO's training programme for the Iraqi armed forces, Bush can no longer complain that Europe is refusing to help the new government in Baghdad.

The EU has launched its own training initiative for Iraqi police officers and justice officials and Paris has made a bilateral offer to Baghdad to train 1,500 police officers in neighbouring Qatar.

If Bush can feel content that his fence-mending trip to Europe was a success, the Europeans may have greater grounds for satisfaction. Not only did the president visit the EU institutions, an important acknowledgment of the EU's growing influence, he spent much of his time reacting to a European agenda.

On Iran, China and NATO reform, Europeans have taken the initiative, leaving Bush in the position of asking for his concerns to be taken into account.

Some in Washington may feel unhappy about this return of European confidence after the bitter internal divisions over Iraq but, as the Taoiseach might say, que sera.