Chirac, Putin meet in Paris on Iraq in shadow of Yukos affair

[NNN0LHI]

http://story.news.yahoo.com/news?tmpl=story&u=/afp/20031107/ts_afp/france_russia&cid=1503&ncid=1473

PARIS (AFP) - Fresh from a summit with EU leaders, Russian President Vladimir Putin met with French President Jacques Chirac for talks likely to focus on Iraq, as the controversy over Russian oil giant Yukos raged on.

Putin arrived Friday at the Elysee presidential palace in the French capital shortly after midday (1100 GMT) for talks followed by a working lunch -- both expected to be one-on-one meetings.

The talks are seen as a way for Paris and Moscow to cement their already strong bilateral ties, reinforced earlier this year when they formed a united front along with Germany against the US-led invasion of Iraq. snip

The French leader's primary goal is to establish a strategic partnership between two major centers of power -- Russia and the European Union (news - web sites), which will soon include several former Soviet republics and satellites.

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[jmcgowanjm]

1. This is gettin' crazy

The European Union was forced on Friday
to publicly reject Italian Prime Minister
Silvio Berlusconi's sudden defense of
Putin's record on Yukos and Chechnya...

What's Berlusconi lookin' at.

[bemildred]

2. That was very interesting.

Silvio did a really first rate job of sucking Pooty-Poot off.
I have seen no rational explanation for that yet, although
one could think that it is merely the natural bonding of
fellow totalitarians. I figure something is up there though,
Silvio is a businessman, and I expect that he will be paid for
his efforts in some fashion.

[0007]

3. McCain thinks Putin is the bad guy and ....

Khodorkovsky is the good guy. I wonder what McCain thinks of Ken Lay?

[NNN0LHI]

4. I don't know beans about this Khodorkovsky fellow.

But Putin is no good guy.

Don