Bush talks with pope as crowds protest war

ROME – President Bush got a sharp dose of Europe’s opposition to his Iraq policy Friday, quietly in the halls of the Vatican from Pope John Paul II and loudly in the streets of Rome from thousands of demonstrators.

The ailing pontiff complained about recent “deplorable events,” an apparent reference to the abuse of Iraqi prisoners by U.S. troops. In the absence of a commitment to shared human values, “neither war nor terrorism will ever be overcome,” he said, struggling to speak.

However, the pope welcomed the recent establishment of an interim government and called for a speedy transfer of sovereignty to the Iraqis.

Not far from the Vatican walls, tens of thousands of protesters took to the streets to demonstrate through central Rome, many with signs demanding Italy withdraw its troops from Iraq. A score of demonstrators hurling stones clashed with police during the march. Others threw firecrackers and set a trash can on fire.

Bush had dinner with a top ally on Iraq, Italian Prime Minister Silvio Berlusconi. Today, the president heads to Paris to meet with one of his sharpest war critics, French President Jacques Chirac.

Despite Berlusconi’s backing, and his decision to send 3,000 Italian troops to Iraq, polls show that a majority of Italians oppose the U.S.-led war and occupation of Iraq, a sentiment common throughout western Europe.

Bush is on a three-day trip to Italy and France to help commemorate the June 1944 liberation of Rome and the allied D-Day invasion of Normandy. He was also using the trip – and an international economic summit next week in Sea Island, Ga. – to try to build more support among leading nations for a new U.N. resolution to deal with post-occupation Iraq.

But the announcement in Baghdad that five U.S. soldiers were killed and five wounded on Friday when their vehicles were attacked in east Baghdad served as a reminder that Iraq remained an extremely dangerous place.

Seated next to the pope, Bush promised his nation would work for “human liberty and human dignity,” without making any reference to Iraq. He presented the pontiff with the presidential medal of freedom, America’s highest civilian award, calling him “a devoted servant of God.”

The president and his wife, Laura Bush, laid a green wreath at the Ardeatine Cave Memorial, where Nazi occupiers massacred 335 Italian citizens in 1944. Bush, alone, approached the wreath, straightened its blue ribbon and bowed his head as a bugler played.

At the Vatican, Bush’s private meeting with the pope lasted about 15 minutes. The media were allowed in briefly to hear their public remarks.

The pope, who is 84 and has Parkinson’s disease, read from a prepared text, speaking in halting English. His hand shook noticeably and, between words, he often inhaled deeply.

The pope paid tribute to the American soldiers who liberated Europe, but he focused his remarks on “the grave unrest in the Middle East and in the Holy Land.” He also welcomed the recent naming of an interim Iraqi government as “an encouraging step toward” sovereignty for that nation.

He delivered his remarks on the Abu Ghraib prison scandal immediately after mentioning the Sept. 11 attacks on the United States. While the pope did not mention the name of the prison, there was little doubt about his reference.

“In the past few weeks other deplorable events have come to light which have troubled the civic and religious conscience of all, and made more difficult a serene and resolute commitment to shared human values,” the pope said.

“In the absence of such a commitment neither war nor terrorism will ever be overcome.”

The pope spoke for more than 20 minutes. Bush spoke for only two, promising at one point to “work for human liberty and human dignity, in order to spread peace and compassion.”

Friday’s was Bush’s third meeting with the pope since he became president.

Bush has aggressively courted Roman Catholic voters – a bloc making up about a quarter of the electorate that split evenly between Bush and Democrat Al Gore in 2000.

Thanking Bush for the medal of freedom award, the pontiff said, “God bless America.”