Bush gives Zapatero chilly reception

President George Bush gave a chilly reception to Spain’s new leader, Prime Minister Jose Luis Rodriguez Zapatero, when the pair spoke on the telephone yesterday.

One day after taking office, Zapatero picked up the phone to call Bush – and got an irate president on the line.

Bush told the Spanish leader his abrupt withdrawal of troops from Iraq would give “false comfort to terrorists”.

In a five-minute conversation, Bush was said to have expressed regret that Zapatero was withdrawing his troops so quickly, even though the Spaniard had campaigned on a pullout pledge.

Spain is the sixth largest contributor of troops in Iraq, and Bush urged that the withdrawal be coordinated with other coalition members so as not to put other forces at risk, the White House said.

Spain’s pullout will occur in four to five weeks, a military spokesman said.

More pointedly, Bush “stressed the importance of carefully considering future actions to avoid giving false comfort to terrorists or enemies of freedom in Iraq,” press secretary Scott McClellan said.

Zapatero has rejected claims that withdrawing troops would appear to be appeasing terrorists, saying his idea of removing them came long before the March 11 commuter-train bombings that killed 191 people in Madrid three days in advance of his election.

Later yesterday, Bush said he was sending diplomatic trouble-shooter John Negroponte to Iraq as America’s first post-war ambassador.

Spain’s pullout of 1,300 soldiers – and an announcement late last night that Honduras plans to withdraw its 370 troops – was a blow to Bush’s portrayal of a solid international coalition in chaotic Iraq.

With no immediate replacement for Spain’s forces, other members of the coalition hastened to rewrite military plans to deal with Iraq’s increasingly bloody landscape.

The souring of relations between the US and Spain comes as Zapatero’s new foreign minister, Miguel Angel Moratinos, is to meet in Washington tomorrow with US Secretary of State Colin Powell and other administration officials.

Honduran President Ricarado Maduro said in a televised speech that the Central American country will remove its troops from Iraq “in the shortest time possible”.

Honduran soldiers had been serving in Najaf under Spanish command, alongside small forces from El Salvador and the Dominican Republic.

Bush held an Oval Office ceremony to announce the nomination of Negroponte, the United States’ top diplomat at the United Nations, as the first US ambassador to post-war Iraq.

Negroponte, aged 64, was instrumental at the UN in winning unanimous approval of a Security Council resolution that demanded Saddam Hussein comply with UN mandates to disarm.

However, the Security Council eventually refused to endorse the overthrow of Saddam, opting instead to extend UN weapons searches.

“John Negroponte is a man of enormous experience and skill” and “has done a really good job of speaking for the United States to the world about our intentions to spread freedom and peace,” said Bush.

Democratic presidential candidate John Kerry also expressed disappointment over Spain’s decision.

“Spain and all the world have an interest in rebuilding an Iraq that is not a haven for terrorists and a failed state,” Kerry said.

“I had hoped the prime minister would have reconsidered his position, and I hope that in the days ahead the United States and the world can work with him to find a way to keep Spain engaged in the efforts in Iraq.”

“Rather than losing partners, I believe it’s critical that we find new coalition partners to share the burden in Iraq,” Kerry said.