Jacques Chirac is faithful in friendship, but he had planned to celebrate his 74th birthday the evening of November 29th, in Riga, where the NATO summit ... Jacques Chirac is faithful in friendship, but he had planned to celebrate his 74th birthday the evening of November 29th, in Riga, where the NATO summit is being held, with a rather awkward friend, Vladimir Putin. But yesterday evening the Kremlin finally announced that the Russian president would "unfortunately" not be at the celebration. The deputy spokesperson for the Kremlin, Dmitriy Peskov, explained in Moscow that discussions had indeed taken place regarding such a trip. "But unfortunately, given the impossibility of coordinating the schedules of the heads of state, ultimately this trip will not take place," he said in very diplomatic terms. It must be noted that the possibility of this three-person dinner (since Latvia's President Vaira Kike-Freiberga was to be among the guests) provoked the anger of American President George Bush on Sunday November 26th. Embarrassed by the scale assumed by this affair, the Latvian president then hesitated about issuing a visa to Vladimir Putin, thereby managing to offend the sensitivity of the Russians. In fact, initially Vaira Kike-Freiberga had planned to make a gesture at one time or another "to wish a happy birthday" to the French president "with the heads of state and government present." The summit was to conclude with a lunch offered to her guests by the Latvian president. But the announcement of the Chirac-Putin dinner had upset this nice schedule. According to Alliance officials, initially the French president wanted to celebrate his birthday in an Armenian restaurant in Riga, with his closest European partners and his Russian counterpart, but without Tony Blair or George W. Bush. Upon learning this, the American President reportedly intervened to block this plan. The Elysee [the president's office] presented a very different version yesterday: "President Putin expressed the wish to come meet the president of the Republic to offer his best wishes, as he has done with other heads of state and government," and "the idea was suggested by Russia of a three-person dinner, hosted by the president of Latvia."
Jacques Chirac is faithful in friendship, but he had planned to celebrate his 74th birthday the evening of November 29th, in Riga, where the NATO summit is being held, with a rather awkward friend, Vladimir Putin. But yesterday evening the Kremlin finally announced that the Russian president would "unfortunately" not be at the celebration. The deputy spokesperson for the Kremlin, Dmitriy Peskov, explained in Moscow that discussions had indeed taken place regarding such a trip. "But unfortunately, given the impossibility of coordinating the schedules of the heads of state, ultimately this trip will not take place," he said in very diplomatic terms. It must be noted that the possibility of this three-person dinner (since Latvia's President Vaira Kike-Freiberga was to be among the guests) provoked the anger of American President George Bush on Sunday November 26th. Embarrassed by the scale assumed by this affair, the Latvian president then hesitated about issuing a visa to Vladimir Putin, thereby managing to offend the sensitivity of the Russians.
In fact, initially Vaira Kike-Freiberga had planned to make a gesture at one time or another "to wish a happy birthday" to the French president "with the heads of state and government present." The summit was to conclude with a lunch offered to her guests by the Latvian president. But the announcement of the Chirac-Putin dinner had upset this nice schedule.
According to Alliance officials, initially the French president wanted to celebrate his birthday in an Armenian restaurant in Riga, with his closest European partners and his Russian counterpart, but without Tony Blair or George W. Bush. Upon learning this, the American President reportedly intervened to block this plan. The Elysee [the president's office] presented a very different version yesterday: "President Putin expressed the wish to come meet the president of the Republic to offer his best wishes, as he has done with other heads of state and government," and "the idea was suggested by Russia of a three-person dinner, hosted by the president of Latvia."
Gawd diplomacy can be petty. In the long run, we're all dead. John Maynard Keynes
