Pope, Bush discuss Mideast violence

VATICAN CITY -- With thousands of Italians converging on Rome to decry the war in Iraq, President Bush received a more subtle but pointed message yesterday about America's Middle East policy in his first meeting with Pope Benedict XVI.

Benedict urged the US president to pursue a "regional and negotiated" solution to the violent crises engulfing the Middle East, a Vatican statement said, and voiced special alarm about "the worrying situation in Iraq" and the plight of the besieged and dwindling community of Christians there.

Bush later said he sought to reassure the leader of the world's largest Christian faith about the possibilities for peace. After his 31-minute private meeting with the pope, a man with whom he shares some conservative religious beliefs, the president said, "I was in awe and it was a moving experience."

On a six-nation swing through Europe, Bush also held talks with Prime Minister Romano Prodi of Italy , whose center-left government has clashed frequently with Washington.

In fact, Italy is home to the most anti-American sentiment of any of the countries that Bush has chosen to visit following a summit in Germany of leading industrialized countries, as protest rallies in Rome yesterday afternoon demonstrated.

Tens of thousands of war opponents and antiglobalization activists marched through the capital to protest Bush's visit, the Associated Press reported. Thousands of police, many in riot gear, were deployed round the Colosseum, the Piazza Venezia, and other sites.

Bush probably saw political value in appearing with the pope, even though he knew to expect admonishment from Benedict on some of his policies.

Any photograph of the president and pope is a reminder of areas they agree on, such as their shared opposition to abortion and same-sex marriage, and thus serves as a quiet papal blessing that reinforces Republican Party efforts to reach out to Roman Catholic voters in the United States.

In foreign policy, however, their differences emerge. Benedict has been vocal in his opposition to bloodshed in the Middle East, singling out Iraq this Easter: "Nothing positive comes from Iraq, torn apart by continual slaughter as the civil population flees."

By urging Bush to seek a negotiated solution, the pope might have been condemning, however gently, the military option pursued by this US administration in Iraq, or the hands-off approach taken until recently in the Israeli-Palestinian conflict.

Still, Bush was spared the more public rebuke he experienced three years ago when Pope John Paul II, after receiving the Presidential Medal of Freedom from Bush, launched into a condemnation of the "deplorable" abuses of Iraqi prisoners at Abu Ghraib prison.

Benedict did not use Bush's presence to make public remarks of substance and delivered his message in private. Bush emerged from the Vatican's regal Apostolic Palace seemingly more subdued.

Arriving, however, Bush was full of smiles, relaxed good cheer, and minimal observance of protocol.

Led by Swiss Guards in their traditional orange, blue, and scarlet-striped uniforms, Bush walked into the palace behind a contingent of papal footmen to reach the pope in his private library.

Laura Bush, wearing the black lace mantilla that is reserved for formal meetings of women with the pope, followed several paces behind.

The two men shook hands. Bush eased into a seat at Benedict's polished, wooden desk, across from the pontiff. Journalists are allowed to attend the first few minutes of the pope's meeting with world dignitaries.

"Good to be with you, sir," Bush said. (Italian journalists noted the breach in protocol: The pope is formally addressed as Your Holiness.)

Later yesterday, during a news conference with Prodi, Bush was asked whether he and the pope talked about the concept of a "just war." The Vatican considered the war in Afghanistan to be justified, but not the one in Iraq.

Bush said the topic was not discussed but that the pope did express his "deep concern" that the "society evolving in Iraq would not tolerate Christians." Bush said he told the pontiff that Iraq's constitution would protect minorities.

Christians in Iraq have been hard hit by violence, kidnappings, and murder; churches are emptying, having been bombed or out of fear. Tens of thousands have fled the country.

Bush and Prodi, after a working lunch at the prime minister's Palazzo Chigi, took pains to portray relations between Washington and Rome as friendly and free of serious bilateral disputes, pointing to several areas of cooperation, including Lebanon and Kosovo.

But they avoided mention of more contentious matters. Those include the trial-in-absentia that started Friday of 26 Americans accused of abducting a radical imam in Italy .