French President Jacques Chirac seized the opportunity provided yesterday by British Prime Minister Tony Blair's 50th birthday to try to make peace with the prime minister after their diplomatic quarrel over the war in Iraq.
But Chirac's choice of birthday present, six bottles of Chateau Mouton Rothschild '89 (plus a crystal decanter), sparked a fresh Anglo-French disagreement over its quality.
Harsh words such as "wine snobbery" and "impressionable palates" were being muttered.
Chirac, who received a Churchill fountain pen from Blair on his 70th birthday last year, sent a diplomatic note, albeit one with what may have been an oblique reference to his weakness for continental holiday freebies.
"Knowing how much you like spending time in France, I have the pleasure of offering you a present that illustrates the quality of regional products in our nation, which you know so well," he said.
"I add the expression of personal esteem and my loyal friendship. Looking forward to seeing you in Evian" -- the French town where the G8 summit will be held next month -- he said.
Under British government rules that limits free ministerial gifts to ?140, six bottles of vintage wallop retailing at ?195 each also saddled Blair with a ?1,000 bill if he wants to drink the stuff, now or in 20 years when it peaks.
Whether Blair still expects to be prime minister in 2023 was one of many birthday details Downing Street officials were not keen to discuss during what they ensured was a hectic working day for their boss -- in London, Dublin and back again in time for a private family dinner.
But claret has been France's most enduring cross-Channel export since Bordeaux destroyed the English wine industry (temporarily as it turns out) in the Middle Ages -- long before champagne was even invented. The experts all have views.
Bettane and Desseauve, one of France's most trusted wine guides, gives two stars out of a possible three for Mouton Rothschild.
But what do they know? Michael Broadbent, doyen of all British wine tasters, insists that the 1989 Bordeaux vintage was "unquestionably a great vintage and one which brought the decade to a resounding close".
Tuesday night No 10 said the wine had not yet arrived -- like the French vote on the second UN resolution.
Blair struck a resolutely diffident pose, telling a media lunch that his face had been used to advertise Sanatogen vitamins -- but that at least it was not Viagra.
Far from the violence ravaging Haiti, a market on the border with the Dominican Republic has maintained a welcome degree of normal everyday life. At the Dajabon border gate, a wave of Haitians press forward, eager to shop at the twice-weekly market about 200km from Haiti’s capital, Port-au-Prince. They are drawn by the market’s offerings — food, clothing, toys and even used appliances — items not always readily available in Haiti. However, with gang violence bad and growing ever worse in Haiti, the Dominican government has reinforced the usual military presence at the border and placed soldiers on alert. While the market continues to
An image of a dancer balancing on the words “China Before Communism” looms over Parisian commuters catching the morning metro, signaling the annual return of Shen Yun, a controversial spectacle of traditional Chinese dance mixed with vehement criticism of Beijing and conservative rhetoric. The Shen Yun Performing Arts company has slipped the beliefs of a spiritual movement called Falun Gong in between its technicolored visuals and leaping dancers since 2006, with advertising for the show so ubiquitous that it has become an Internet meme. Founded in 1992, Falun Gong claims nearly 100 million followers and has been subject to “persistent persecution” in
ONLINE VITRIOL: While Mo Yan faces a lawsuit, bottled water company Nongfu Spring and Tsinghua University are being attacked amid a rise in nationalist fervor At first glance, a Nobel prize winning author, a bottle of green tea and Beijing’s Tsinghua University have little in common, but in recent weeks they have been dubbed by China’s nationalist netizens as the “three new evils” in the fight to defend the country’s valor in cyberspace. Last month, a patriotic blogger called Wu Wanzheng filed a lawsuit against China’s only Nobel prize-winning author, Mo Yan (莫言), accusing him of discrediting the Communist army and glorifying Japanese soldiers in his fictional works set during the Japanese invasion of China. Wu, who posts online under the pseudonym “Truth-Telling Mao Xinghuo,” is seeking
‘SURPRISES’: The militants claim to have successfully tested a missile capable of reaching Mach 8 and vowed to strike ships heading toward the Cape of Good Hope Yemen’s Houthi rebels claim to have a new, hypersonic missile in their arsenal, Russia’s state media reported on Thursday, potentially raising the stakes in their attacks on shipping in the Red Sea and surrounding waterways against the backdrop of Israel’s war with Hamas in the Gaza Strip. The report by the state-run RIA Novosti news agency cited an unidentified official, but provided no evidence for the claim. It comes as Moscow maintains an aggressively counter-Western foreign policy amid its grinding war on Ukraine. However, the Houthis have for weeks hinted about “surprises” they plan for the battles at sea to counter the