by Robert MacPherson 43 minutes ago
Ukraine
NATO
President George W. Bush
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BUCHAREST (AFP) - European leaders kept Georgia andwaiting at's doorstep Thursday in a major setback for USat his last summit of the transatlantic alliance.
Inching deeper into what, during the Cold War, had been enemy territory, NATO extended formal invitations to once-communist Albania and Croatia to start negotiations to become the 27th and 28th members of the bloc.
If all goes well, those two Balkan states could be full-fledged members when NATO -- the world's most powerful military bloc -- celebrates its 60th anniversary next year with a summit in the adjacent French and German cities of Strasbourg and Kehl.
But despite 11th-hour American arm-twisting, European leaders -- wary of upsetting an increasingly assertive Russia -- denied coveted pre-membership status to Georgia and Ukraine, at least until the very end of this year.
Both former Soviet republics want in to the so-called Membership Action Plan, or MAP, which grooms erstwhile communist states in eastern European for NATO accession, as a counterfoil to Russian influence.
By way of consolation, NATO Secretary General Jaap de Hoop Scheffer said NATO would offer Georgia and Ukraine "intensive engagement", along with a vague promise of membership sometime down the line.
"We agree today that these countries will become members of NATO," he told reporters as the heads of state and government broke for lunch. "That is quite something."
It would be up to NATO foreign ministers to make "a first assessment of progress" when they meet in December, Scheffer said, adding that they would have the authority to grant MAP status if they choose to do so.
Making the best of the situation, Georgia's minister for Euro-Atlantic integration, Giorgi Baramidze, told AFP: "The decision has been made to accept us moving toward NATO."
"We think this is a historic achievement for Georgia," he added.
With outgoing Russian President Vladimir Putin set to join the summit on Friday, his deputy foreign minister Alexander Grushko said letting Georgia and Ukraine into NATO would be "a big strategic mistake".
It would, he added, entail "the most serious consequences for common European security".
The other hefty item on the Bucharest summit agenda -- getting more European NATO members to send more troops and material to fight the Taliban in Afghanistan -- was being tackled later Thursday.
France has pledged to send a battalion, comprising fewer than 1,000 men, to be deployed in eastern Afghanistan -- freeing up US troops to reinforce hard-pressed Canadians in the south.
In a separate but not unexpected development, Greece foiled Macedonia's NATO ambitions when it blocked an invitation to Skopje to begin membership negotiations, due to a dispute over the name of the former Yuglosav republic.
Macedonia wants to be known as the Republic of Macedonia in international forums, but Greece thinks doing so would imply a claim on its like-named northern province -- an argument driven mainly by domestic politics.
"An invitation will be extended as soon as a mutually acceptable solution is reached," a NATO official told reporters.
Bush, keen to put some gloss on his foreign policy legacy in the waning months of a presidency tarnished by Iraq, pushed hard at the summit for Georgia and Ukraine to be ushered into NATO's antechamber.
But in an alliance that takes decisions only by consensus, he was undermined by Europeans -- led by French President Nicolas Sarkozy and German Chancellor Angela Merkel -- fearful that such a move might destabilise an already volatile region on Russia's southern flank.
In a German newspaper interview published Thursday, Georgian President Mikheil Saakashvili warned that by keeping Georgia and Ukraine in the cold, NATO would be handing a gift to Kremlin hawks.
"If we do not get commitments, then the conservative wing at the Kremlin will be strengthened," he told the Handelsblatt daily. "Then we'll give Moscow a free ride to attempt blackmail. We are at a dangerous crossroads."
In tandem with the summit, the United States and the Czech Republic reached agreement Thursday on stationing in the Czech Republic a part of a broader US missile defense radar system that is vehemently opposed by Russia.
"This legally-binding agreement calls for the stationing of a US radar in the Czech Republic to track ballistic missiles ... linked to other US missile defense facilities in Europe and the United States," they said in a statement.
Bush said Wednesday the system is "primarily" intended to deal with missiles liable to be fired by "rogue regimes" in the Middle East -- coded language for Iran -- but Russia sees it as a challenge to its own security.
President George W. Bush and Mrs. Laura Bush yesterday, with Romania’s President Traian Basescu and Mrs. Maria Basescu, left, and NATO Secretary General Jaap de Hoop Scheffer and Mrs. Jeannine de Hoop Scheffer during the NATO Summit official greeting at the Cotroceni Palace in Bucharest. 

One of the biggest gatherings of world leaders, the 20th annual NATO summit which began on Wednesday continued today in Bucharest.

NATO leaders begin negotiations in earnest over Afghanistan Thursday, after the opening day of their summit in Bucharest saw a successful French offer of more troops, but a public disagreement over the alliance's enlargement.

In the morning, the heads of the 26-strong alliance will hold their first formal working session, picking up on the themes of Wednesday's dinner - enlargement, Kosovo and Afghanistan, plus other issues.

The conflict of interests involves a delicate diplomatic brinkmanship between NATO's historic open-door policy and Russia's feeling that the alliances' borders are growing too close for comfort.

At the Bucharest summit, Albania and Croatia too will begin the formal process of their membership.
 
NATO's backing of a United States missile defense system in Poland and the Czech Republic has been harshly condemned by Vladimir Putin, who will be making his first appearance at this year's summit to express his fears of a new arms race.

The leaders of Albania and Croatia will get their first taste of NATO's highest body, when they sit with their counterparts, alongside Secretary General Jaap de Hoop Scheffer, in a special session.

The ambitions of Macedonia, the southernmost of the former Yugoslav republics -- have been challenged by neighbour Greece in a dispute over its official name.

Greece refuses to recognise the former Yugoslav republic's name because it is the same as that of the northern Greek province of Macedonia and Athens worries that this could imply a claim on its territory.