US president George Bush will stay only 12 hours when he visits the Republic in June for an EU-US summit, The Irish Times has learned, and most of that time will be overnight.
Plans for the visit, now well advanced, indicate that Mr Bush will arrive late on June 25th from Washington and stay the night at a location outside Dublin, possibly Dromoland Castle in Co Clare or Ashford Castle in Co Mayo.
The formal summit meeting on June 26th is expected to last two hours, followed by a 90-minute working lunch, according to sources in Washington.
This is the normal time-scale for annual EU-US summits, such as that hosted by the Greek presidency in Washington last year.
The US President is scheduled to travel to Turkey after the summit and, because of the time difference, is expected to leave the Republic at midday or shortly afterwards to avoid arriving there in the middle of the night. The agenda for the summit will be dominated by the need to improve Europe-US relations in the wake of disagreements over Iraq and trade, and by US plans for the handover of sovereignty to Iraq five days later, sources said.
The US is seeking to broaden its military coalition in Iraq after the July 1st sovereignty handover with greater involvement of the UN or NATO, and the co-operation of European Union countries will be crucial.
To counter the possibly negative impact of anti-Bush demonstrations on corporate America, the Irish and American sides have discussed plans to use the occasion to highlight the value to the Irish economy of US investment over the years, sources in Washington said.
This will be Mr Bush's first visit to the Republic as president. He attended a pre-war summit with the British Prime Minister, Mr Blair, at Hillsborough Castle, Co Down, on April 7th, 2003, when he also met the Taoiseach, Mr Ahern, and Northern Ireland political leaders.
There are no plans this time for a political initiative on Northern Ireland, and Mr Bush "won't be dropping in to a pub for a drink" as former President Clinton did when he first visited Ireland in November 1995, a well-informed source said.
Anti-Bush protests in Dublin and at the summit venue are planned by the Irish Anti-War Movement, the NGO Peace Alliance and the Peace and Neutrality Alliance.