Sarkozy rekindles rapport with US

Source: Agencies  |   2008-6-15  |     NEWSPAPER EDITION

FRENCH President Nicolas Sarkozy is a walking billboard for American President George W. Bush's message that US-European relations have rebounded from the rocky times surrounding the invasion of Iraq.

Even before he was elected last year, Sarkozy worked to mend relations with the United States that were bruised by former FRENCH President Jacques Chirac's clash with Bush, especially over the Iraq war. Sarkozy is so pro-America that the energetic conservative is known in France as "Sarko the American."

Still Bush, who was due to meet Sarkozy yesterday, is nearing the end of his two-term presidency, and France must first look out for its own interests. And Sarkozy must watch over his. Sarkozy's approval ratings have dived after a year of unpopular domestic policies. They have been starting to inch upward, and he could lose that momentum by playing host to Bush who remains unpopular in Europe.

Time, though, is on Bush's side. The French, once indignant over the war, have turned indifferent about Bush and are more interested in who will be his successor.

Simon Serfaty, a foreign relations expert at the Center for Strategic and International Studies, says Sarkozy has reorganized FRENCH foreign policy within Europe.

"In my judgment, the bilateral relationship between Washington and Paris today is better than the bilateral relationship between Washington and London and the relationship between Paris and Berlin," he said.

Sarkozy gets low marks for his domestic reforms, yet has remained combative and determined. "I know that there are those who claim that Sarkozy's first year in office was just a disaster," Serfaty said. "Sarkozy behaved like a teenager, to be sure. But he was spanked."