FRANCE: French officials hope the visit of the US Secretary of State, Ms Condoleezza Rice, to Paris today will mark a turning point in Franco-American relations. It was Ms Rice who famously said in 2003 that the US should "punish France, ignore Germany and forgive Russia" for opposing the US-led invasion of Iraq.
Ms Rice's decision to deliver the main speech of her European and Middle East tour here this afternoon was seen as tantamount to an apology. She will address several hundred guests, all hand-picked by the State Department, in the amphitheatre of the Institut des Sciences Politiques.
The 40-minute speech will lay out the Bush administration's vision of transatlantic relations, and will be followed by a meeting with President Jacques Chirac, a brief press conference and a dinner with the French Foreign Minister, Mr Michel Barnier.
One of the main purposes of the Paris visit is to prepare the ground for Mr Bush's dinner with Mr Chirac in Brussels on February 21st. The Elysée had hoped that Mr Chirac would be invited to Washington before Mr Bush came to Europe, but the White House demurred.
In an interview with Libération newspaper yesterday, Mr Barnier said, "The time has come for a new start in our relations." But he made it clear that France, and Europe, reserve the right to disagree.
"The Americans must have confidence in Europe and accept that Europe should assume her full role on the international stage," the Foreign Minister said. "Alliance does not mean allegiance. A renewed Atlantic Alliance must rest on two [American and European] pillars."
Ms Rice was dissuaded from delivering a speech on Mr Bush's plan to "spread democracy" throughout the "Greater Middle East" at the Institut du Monde Arabe.
In June 2004, Mr Chirac reacted negatively to the Bush plan, saying: "The countries of the Middle East and North Africa do not need missionaries of democracy."
Mr Bush holds a grudge against Mr Chirac for depriving him of a UN mandate for the Iraq invasion, but Mr Chirac has tried to smooth things over by wholeheartedly supporting the elections in Iraq, and congratulating Mr Bush on what the French President called "an important stage in the political reconstruction of Iraq."
One source of tension - French demands for a timetable for a US departure from Iraq - has disappeared. Paris seems to have accepted that it will have little influence over US policy in Iraq.
France now shares with the European Union its remaining points of discord with Washington: how to deal with the Iranian nuclear programme; lifting the arms embargo against China; relations with Cuba.
France also shares Europe's highest hope for Mr Bush's second term: that Washington will stop its unquestioning support for the Israeli Prime Minister, Mr Ariel Sharon, and work sincerely for peace between Israelis and Palestinians.
Mr Barnier has said repeatedly that a genuine US commitment would be "the first test of renewed transatlantic relations." He will seek to convince Ms Rice that peace between Israelis and Palestinians must precede the "Greater Middle East" plan.
"The Americans will have to understand that this conflict is central and that without peace in the near east, there will be no movement towards democracy in the Greater Middle East," he said.
The US Secretary of State's remark that Israel would have to "make the hard decisions that must be taken in order to promote peace and help the emergence of a democratic Palestinian state" were perceived here as a tiny shift in US policy.
The real question, French officials say, is whether the Bush administration will be willing to exert pressure on Mr Sharon to give up settlements in the West Bank and compromise on Jerusalem.
If not, they fear the present optimism could be short-lived.