PRESIDENT CHIRAC claimed last night that the Prime Minister was misguided to imagine that he could play the honest broker between Europe and the Bush Administration.

Speaking three days before his first official visit to London for eight years, M Chirac voiced his affection for Tony Blair and the “tough love” between France and Britain.

But he reasserted his vision of an “historically inevitable, multipolar” world in which Europe would counterbalance the United States.

The French leader, who turns 72 next month, sketched his vision and what he called the ancient Franco-British bond in a rare interview with The Times and other British newspapers in his gilded meeting room on the first floor of the Elysée Palace. On Thursday, he is to stay with the Queen at Windsor Castle after a summit with Mr Blair.

It was now vital for the United States to relaunch the Middle East peace process, M Chirac said, but he was not optimistic that it was possible to do business with Washington or that Britain could play the linking role across the Atlantic that Mr Blair claims with the Bush administration.

“I am not sure, with America as it is these days, that it would be easy for someone, even the British, to be an honest broker. Perhaps that will change but that is the current state of things,” he said.

He recalled the Franco-British summit at Le Touquet on the eve of the Iraq War last year. “I said then to Tony Blair: ‘We have different positions on Iraq. Your position should at least have some use. That is to try to obtain in exchange a relaunch of the peace process in the Middle East . . . You absolutely have to obtain something in exchange for your support. Well, Britain gave its support but I did not see much in return. I am not sure that it is in the nature of our American friends at the moment to return favours systematically."

M Chirac made clear that he was in no mood to make a gesture towards Washington as President Bush enters his second term. In passing, he referred to Donald Rumsfeld, the Defence Secretary, as “that nice guy — I’ve forgotten his name — who talked about Old Europe”. He outlined in the clearest terms for some time his theory of a “multipolar” world. Washington sees this as code for French attempts to lead Europe as a counter-power to the United States.

“The evolution of the world towards a multipolar situation is inevitable. That is part of the evolution of human history,” he said. “In consequence there will be a great American pole, a great European pole, a Chinese one, an Indian one, eventually a south American pole. These great poles have to live together.”

To prevent war between the poles, there must be a United Nations, he added. “The second condition is that the two poles that are founded on the same values — that is America and Europe — get on together so that they can be an element of dissuasion towards poles which have another culture, other historical values. The transatlantic link is absolutely essential in this multipolar world.”

In relaxed and reflective form as night fell outside, M Chirac added: “I do not feel at all angry towards the Americans. We have never shown the slightest bad mood towards them.” There was, however, no chance that he would send French troops to Iraq.

The French leader said he had “a lot of esteem and a lot of friendship” for Mr Blair and had only fallen out with him once — not over Iraq but over agriculture. For the first time, he gave an account of the celebrated spat between the two at a Brussels summit two years ago after a Franco-German deal on the Common Agriculture Policy.

“I got angry with him. It was probably the fatigue after a long summit. We said unpleasant things about each other that we didn’t mean.” According to the British account at the time, M Chirac called Mr Blair “badly brought up”.

Media reporting of bad blood between the two leaders was fantasy, he said. “We have no reason to quarrel. When I go to London I am very happy. I arrive (in Downing Street) and he gives me news of Leo (Tony Blair’s youngest son) or Leo comes up and says ‘bonjour Chirac’ in French. I’m happy to see them.”

M Chirac also played down the tension between the rival British and French approaches to the European Union. “There is no opposition between a British vision and a French vision of Europe. All that has no meaning. That is an extraordinarily superficial and facile idea of what Europe is about . . . We have always had differences with Britain and we have always continued hand-in-hand.” The British would eventually vote “yes” in their referendum on the EU Constitutional treaty, M Chirac predicted. “Good sense triumphs in the end over mood.”

This year’s celebrations of the bicentenary of the Entente Cordiale had demonstrated the friendship between Britain and France. Musing on the old cross-Channel relationship, he said the rivalry was always founded on mutual esteem. “We enjoyed hating each other . . . It was a kind of violent love,” he said.

He recalled negotiating Britain’s entry to the European Community when he served as Agriculture Minister in the early 1970s. He still felt bad because he had made very insulting remarks in French about the British minister then, believing that he did not speak the language. He later found out that he spoke it perfectly. “I thought, that’s a real example of British hypocrisy, hiding for two years that he spoke French!” M Chirac said he had not yet decided whether he would run again for a third term as president in 2007.

PRESIDENT’S ITINERARY

However, the most interesting and unexpected moment in the visit could come when the President is given a podium at The Guildhall. All that is known about his address is the subject matter: values and directions for the 21st century. Whether it is luck or diplomatic arrangement that the Downing Street photocall with Tony Blair comes before and not after the speech can only be a matter for conjecture.

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