MercoPress. South Atlantic News Agency

I'm sorry

Uruguayan president Jorge Batlle will personally apologize to Argentine president Eduardo Duhalde in Buenos Aires for offensive remarks about the Argentine people and current situation that erupted during a heated debate with journalists and which received ample coverage on both sides of the River Plate.

Mr. Batlle is expected Tuesday morning in Buenos Aires where he will explain that the expressions "Argentines are a bunch of thieves", and "President Duhalde has no political strength, no support, and doesn't know where he's heading?.", actually were taken out of context from a private conversation following an interview with reporters from Bloomberg.

The airing of the Bloomberg report early Monday afternoon sent shock waves on both shores of the neighboring countries.

In Montevideo, at mid afternoon president Batlle convened an urgent press conference where he explained how the circumstances and his sometimes "too frank and spontaneous" character led to the controversial remarks, "off the record", accusing the reporters of acting aggressively in their questioning about the current situation in the area and trying to imply the Argentine financial crisis was comparable with Uruguay.

During the controversial "off the record" Bloomberg report, Mr. Batlle not only said the Argentines were "thieves" and Mr. Duhalde had no political support, but also called the journalists "ignorant" of financial history for trying to identify Uruguay with Argentina. Mr. Batlle added the Argentines like to blame others for their problems and anticipated that the next Argentine president was going to be none less than Carlos Menem, "whom I will be receiving on Thursday".

Mr. Batlle during the private conversation at the beginning was reluctant to talk about the "Argentine situation and the Argentine problems that belong to the Argentines", but ended recalling a recent remark by an Argentine Senator and former union leader who said "if we stop stealing for a couple of years, Argentina will rapidly recover".

"I feel aggravated because this news company (Bloomberg) aired a private conversation that had no reference at all with the issues of the pre arranged interview", said president Batlle on national television, adding that "the private conversation has been used to harm president Duhalde, to harm Uruguay, to harm our brotherly relations with Argentina".

Mr. Batlle also underlined his Argentine roots remembering his mother is Argentine and so was his first wife, "I'm often accused of being too Argentine, too porteño (people of Buenos Aires)"..

Actually in Buenos Aires after the initial impact, disbelief and indignation, plus a personal phone call from Batlle to president Duhalde, the official line was that "the historical friendship between the Argentine and Uruguayan people demands us to look forward and consider the incident over".

The Argentine presidency spokesman Eduardo Amadeo indicated that the two presidents will be meeting at 11:00 Tuesday morning, "when president Duhalde expects to receive the corresponding dialogue (apologies)", stressing however that "Argentines and Uruguayans will come out of the crisis working together".

Argentine diplomatic sources indicated it would be most interesting to talk with the Uruguayan president about "Argentine corruption" since Uruguayan banks have traditionally and wholeheartedly received Argentine money "without questioning its origin, and never telling us either".

In Montevideo Government House solicitors were convened to analyze filing a demand against Bloomberg for airing a private conversation.

Bloomberg's official line is that as long as the camera is on there's no such thing as "an off the record".

Nevertheless a big question remains unanswered, if the interview took place on May 29th., why was the "private conversation", following the official interview aired Monday June 3rd.?

The incident occurs at a most unfortunate moment precisely when multilateral institutions are helping Uruguay to overcome the spill over from the Argentine financial crisis, and Argentina is still waiting for the IMF to come to its relief. .