Blair echoes Kerry; British politicians echo Repubs!

[ProSense]

Blair Urges U.S. to Seek Help From Syria and Iran

By ALAN COWELL
Published: November 13, 2006

LONDON, Nov. 13 — Confronted by likely shifts in American thinking on Iraq after the Democrat electoral sweep, Prime Minister Tony Blair called today for a stronger effort to embrace Syria and Iran as interlocutors to promote the diplomacy of peace across the Middle East.

Mr. Blair’s remarks were made a day before he is scheduled to address a bipartisan panel in Washington, the Iraq Study Group, on some of the same themes by way of a transatlantic video link. Mr. Blair made the remarks in his annual foreign policy speech, his first major pronouncement since the triumph of the Democratic party in the American midterm elections.

According to a British official, who spoke in return for anonymity under civil service rules, Mr. Blair did not wish to give the impression “that there is some big strategic shift going on,” since Britain had always had a policy of engagement with Syria and Iran.

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Calls by Democrats for new thinking on Iraq have unnerved some British politicians, who fear that a precipitate American withdrawal could jeopardize British troops still serving in Iraq. The British leaders are anxious to ensure that they are consulted closely by Washington on the evolving Iraq policy.

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Congress Approves Kerry Legislation Urging Summit of Iraq and Its Neighbors to End Civil War and Build Political Solution

[ginnyinWI]

1. maybe now Blair will come out of *'s shadow and speak up! n/t