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LONDON - Perhaps it wasn't the most appropriate present British Prime Minister Gordon Brown has ever received. When he left Camp David this week, President George W. Bush handed the usually formally attired PM a brown leather bomber jacket.
It bore the United States presidential seal, with its symbol of an eagle, olive branch and arrows, and the label "Rt Hon Gordon Brown." It came in a huge cardboard box wrapped in gold paper also bearing the presidential seal.
The jacket was the same as the one worn by Bush at Camp David at his first meeting with former Prime Minister Tony Blair in 2001. It is understood that Brown gave President Bush a more conventional present - a book about Winston Churchill, the first British Prime Minister to visit Camp David. During his visit, Brown repeatedly referred to Churchill as he spoke about the historic links between the US and Britain. Blair loaned a bust of Churchill to Bush for the duration of his term of office. It is on display in the White House.
In January 2003, Blair received a holdall from the US Government. In July that year, Bush gave him some silver beakers. In July 2001, Blair gave Bush a coat. In March 2003, the month the Iraq war began, he gave him a book, the title of which was not disclosed. He handed over another book in November 2004. His final pressie, in July last year, was some "golf items."
- INDEPENDENT
