MercoPress. South Atlantic News Agency

Kirchner-Powell meeting June 10

United States Secretary of State Colin Powell will be meeting Argentine President Nestor Kirchner in Buenos Aires next June 10, following the top US official participation in a regional summit in Santiago de Chile.

The General Assembly of Foreign Secretaries from the Organization of American States, OAS, is scheduled to take place in Chile between June 8 and 10. This will the second gesture of President George Bush administration's towards the new Argentine government. Two days before taking office on May 25, President Bush personally phoned Mr. Kirchner to congratulate him and invite him to visit Washington.

According to United States analysts Washington's renewed interest in Argentina and particularly in Mr. Kirchner, arises from the fact that the former Santa Cruz governor is relatively unknown in US political circles, he has pledged a "strategic alliance" with Brazil and the assumption ceremony in Buenos Aires seems to have turned into a most Latinamerican event with presidents Lula da Silva from Brazil, Cuba's Fidel Castro and Venezuela's Hugo Chavez as cheerleaders. Actually both Mr. Castro and his self proclaimed first "disciple" Mr. Chavez are particularly worrisome figures for Washington.

United States special envoy to Mr. Kirchner's assumption was a rather low ranking official, Mel Martínez head of the Housing and Urban Development Department, while the rest of the region was present with their heads of state.

Two days after Mr. Kirchner took office the State Department contacted Argentine Foreign Affairs Minister Rafael Bielsa and suggested Mr. Powell's visit.

Mr. Bielsa has defined the relation of the Kirchner administration with Washington, as "cooperative without co-habitation", in direct reference to the Menem-Di Tella days when the relation with the US was described as "carnal".

Cabinet chief Alberto Fernández, one of Mr. Kirchner's closest aides said that the President "never doubted he was going to have good relations with the Unites States. But it will be mature relations based on what suits Argentina, not on the country's automatic alignment or submission to a foreign power".

As to candidate Kirchner's apparent aloofness towards Washington Mr. Fernández said it's was quiet odd that a presidential hopeful "should need first the dispensation of the US Ambassador, then the business community and only later worry about what the people think".

"United States has realized that we wish a serious, mature relation, and that we're not anti Americans", remarked a source from the Argentine Foreign Affairs Ministry organizing Mr. Powell's first visit to Argentina