WORLD / America
Bush tries to revive rapport with Putin
(Agencies)
Updated: 2007-07-02 09:04
US President George W. Bush (R) walks with his Russian counterpart
Vladimir Putin as Putin is welcomed to Bush's family home in
Kennebunkport, Maine, July 1, 2007. [Reuters]
Relations are rocky between US President Bush and Russian President
Vladimir Putin, but they began their overnight visit at the Bush family's
seaside summer home on Sunday with warm handshakes, lobster dinner and a
hair-raising spin through the Atlantic's choppy waters.
The US president knows what he wants from the talks: Convince Putin that
a US missile defense system in Eastern Europe would not threaten Russia.
Bring the Kremlin behind tough new penalties aimed at Iran's suspected
nuclear weapons program. Generally defrost relations.
What the Russian president seeks is less clear.
Putin requested an audience with Bush on his way to Guatemala, where
Olympic officials are picking a host city for the 2014 winter games. Bush
aides braced for the possibility of a surprise on the scale of the one
the Russian leader dropped last month in Germany, on the missile defense
dispute.
"Does Putin have something he plans to throw at Bush's feet?" wondered
Sarah Mendelson, Russia policy expert and senior fellow at the Center for
Strategic and International Studies.
Former President George H.W. Bush collected Putin at a nearby airport,
accompanying him by helicopter and then limousine to the
stone-and-shingle compound that's been in his family for over 100 years.
Emerging from the car, Putin had a smile for the waiting current
president, and kisses and large bouqets of flowers for first lady Laura
Bush and former first lady Barbara Bush.
The Bushes escorted Putin to the guest house where he was spending the
night, and then showed off another perk of the property situated on a
craggy finger of rock. The elder Bush immediately piled his son and the
Russian leader -- everyone clad in black heavy-duty boating jackets --
into his superpowered navy-and-white speedboat, Fidelity III, for about a
45-minute tour. Afterward, two generations of Bushes and others dined
with Putin on traditional Maine treats: "lobster, what else?" joked Laura
Bush, plus swordfish and blueberry and pecan pie.
There was talk of early-morning fishing on Monday before an informal
meeting and appearance before reporters. The less-than-24-hour
get-together was ending with lunch.
"It's pretty casual up here, as you know, unstructured," Bush had said as
he awaited Putin's arrival, the water sparkling behind him and the sea
breezes blowing. "OK? It's been real," he said later, dismissing the
media horde that came to see the meetings get underway.
Both sides insisted there was no set agenda and scant potential for
announcements. With expectations lowered and the relaxed itinerary,
Mendelson only somewhat jokingly termed it "the no-summit summit."
Before leaving Moscow for the US, Putin had said his "very good, I would
say friendly" relations should create a positive atmosphere. "If it
wasn't that way, I wouldn't go, and I wouldn't have been invited," he
said. "In politics, as in sports, there is always competition."
Indeed, US-Russian relations have slid to their worst point since the
Cold War.
An anti-terrorism bond forged after the Sept. 11 attacks has been chipped
at repeatedly. Disputes developed over the Iraq war, missile defense
plans, the fate of democracy in Russia, NATO expansion to Russia's
doorstep and sniping over what each side views as meddling in former
Soviet republics.
There has been increasing cooperation on Iran and weapons proliferation.
But Putin, appealing to nationalist sentiments in Russia and eager to
re-establish his energy-rich country on the world stage, already was
becoming more assertive. Things then took a bad turn after the US said in
January it planned to build a missile defense system based in the Czech
Republic and Poland, ex-Soviet satellites that now are NATO members.
Moscow is not persuaded by the argument that the system targets a
possible future threat from Iranian nuclear missiles. The Kremlin
threatened to aim missiles at Europe and denounced the US as an
irresponsible source of force.
At a summit last month of world economic powers, Putin surprised Bush by
proposing that the system instead use an old Soviet-era radar facility in
Azerbaijan instead of the Czech and Polish sites. It is an idea that US
officials do not want to reject outright. But they have concluded it
would not work as a substitute, only perhaps as an early warning
supplemental component.
The two sides also are fighting over Kosovo. The US backs the Serbian
province's desire for independence; Russia sides with Serbia and opposes
it.
On Iran, Bush is seeking Putin's backing for a third round of penalties
against Tehran for defying U.N. orders to halt uranium enrichment. Iran
says the enrichment is intended for a nuclear energy program. The West
suspects Iran wants to develop nuclear bombs.
The US has begun discussing with Security Council members a proposal to
require all nations to inspect cargo for illicit nuclear-related
shipments or arms coming from or going to Iran and to freeze assets of a
number of Iranian banks, a senior administration official. The official
spoke on condition of anonymity because the talks are in their initial
stages.
Russia and China previously have balked at such measures, supporting more
modest penalties that have had little effect. But there are signs the
Kremlin may now be in a more cooperative mood.
Stephen Sestanovich, an ambassador to former Soviet republics under
President Clinton, said the issues are too technical and the sides too
entrenched for heads of state to produce breakthroughs. What Bush can
accomplish, he said, is soothing Russia's sense it has been ignored while
making the case that tough talk is hurting Moscow.
"This wouldn't be the worst moment to call Putin on the kind of rhetoric
you've heard out of Moscow of late," said Sestanovich, now at the Council
on Foreign Relations.
The meeting is the only one Bush has held with a foreign leader in
Kennebunkport. Zbigniew Brzezinski, President Carter's national security
adviser, criticized it as a "ridiculous" reward for Putin's harsh stance
and an inappropriate setting for serious talks. Nearly 2,000
demonstrators, too, protested the meeting and the Iraq war by marching
toward Walker's Point and chanting "impeach, impeach, impeach."
Still it could be the last chance for, as Mendleson called it, "rebooting
the relationship."
Russia holds elections in March to choose Putin's successor. Bush is out
of office in 19 months. So the only other time for the leaders to get
together is briefly on the sidelines of a fall summit in Australia of
Asia-Pacific leaders.
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