The woman who President Bush calls his High Prophet today sets off to try and control the international consequences of this week's publication of the new Abu Ghraib images and the UN's report on Guantanamo Bay.

Karen Hughes was appointed in September to the post of Undersecretary of State for Public Diplomacy and Public Affairs, dubbed by Vice President Dick Cheney "the hardest job in government", with the responsibility of remaking America's image in the world, above all in the Middle East.

Today, caught in a snare of bad timing, she leaves for just her second trip to the region.

Already facing a delicate tour of the Gulf States this weekend, which was expected to be dominated by the controversy over the Muhammad cartoons, Ms Hughes, 49, now has more questions to deal with when she represents America and the Bush Administration at an "Islamic World Forum" in Qatar on Saturday.

"I don't know if she's looking forward to it. She's certainly got her work cut out for her, certainly," says James Phillips, a Middle East expert at the right-leaning Heritage Foundation in Washington. "It really is a tough job."

Despite her lack of experience of foreign affairs, Ms Hughes's appointment in September 2005 - with a brief to shake up a neglected corner of the US State Department - was interpreted as a move by Mr Bush to put one of his "biggest brains" on the subject of America's image.

According to Mr Phillips and other Capitol Hill analysts, the decision was another sign of a new, softer White House strategy to win the contest of ideas which it believes underpins the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan.

"There's more recognition of a long-term ideological struggle, the understanding that Bin Ladenism is going to outlast Bin Laden," says Mr Phillips.

"Much of this new approach means reaching out to moderate Muslim leaders and meeting the need to present a viable alternative to the radical Islamic vision of al-Qaeda. She's point woman on that."

But Ms Hughes's first "listening tour" abroad, in September, was viewed, at best, as a mixed success. "She got an earful," is the verdict of Mr Phillips.

Memorably harangued by a group of a women at a left-wing meeting in Turkey and left confused in Egypt, Ms Hughes was lambasted in the Middle Eastern press for her banality and an apparent lack of knowledge and tact.

"Not very experienced in diplomacy," was the verdict of Milliyet, a left-of-centre Turkish daily newspaper. "Painfully clueless," said the Arab News, Saudi Arabia's English-language paper.

As the 16 American journalists who accompanied Ms Hughes pointed out, she relied on stock phrases and vague, heart-warming statements.

She said that America wanted Palestinians "to have the experience of having children and families." In Ankara, Ms Hughes told her audience: "I love all kids. And I understand that is something I have in common with the Turkish people."

She was also criticised for telling al-Jazeera three times that Mr Bush was the "very first President" to support a Palestinian state, even though former President Bill Clinton spent much of his last weeks in office trying to secure a Middle East peace deal that would create "a sovereign, viable Palestinian state".

"Hopefully she's further along the learning curve now, I hope she's got something to say beyond that she's a mother," said Mr Phillips.

But even her critics have acknowledged that the former television reporter from Texas is taking a bolder, more engaged approach to a job that was left empty by Mr Bush for two years before being filled by a Manhattan "brand manager", and a former State Department spokeswoman who lasted little more than six months in the role.

Ms Hughes's close ties with Mr Bush, for instance, have enabled her to meet at much higher levels than her predecessors. In September, she met the Egyptian Prime Minister and the King of Saudi Arabia. Tomorrow she will mingle with the foreign ministers of at least six Muslim nations.

She told Time magazine this month that the State Department has set up a new "media monitoring unit", which watches Arab television and the foreign press and produces a daily "rapid response report" for Cabinet ministers and Ambassadors.

On Wednesday, Ms Hughes's immediate superior, Condoleezza Rice, the US Secretary of State, announced that she would seek $85 million to support human rights activists and dissidents in Iran and radically enhance the US Government's media operations, Ms Hughes's responsibility.

Ms Hughes, who has served by Mr Bush's side since becoming his press director in 1994 and then all-answering "Counselor" when he became President in 2000, has also made one clear change to improve the press coverage of her second trip abroad: this time, no journalists have been invited.

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