Merkel also resisted pressure from Washington to send German troops to southern Afghanistan where the US-led forces are taking the brunt of the fighting.

Nevertheless, both sides have managed to keep the diplomatic door open and continue reaching compromises.

Uncertain future

Despite the good working relationship between Bush and Merkel, the US leader remains unpopular among the German population and most of the politicians who are already looking at his successor for future transatlantic ties.

"I will not miss George W. Bush," said Eckart von Klaeden, foreign policy spokesman of Merkel's Christian Democratic Union-Christian Social Union faction in the German Parliament, on Tuesday.

Before greeting Bush at Meseberg, Merkel said she will not talk much with her guest about his farewell, but "there will be a new era," she added.

The US presidential campaigns have gained extensive media coverage in Germany with political analysts speculating what kind of Europe policy the candidates might pursue and how it would affect Germans.

German opinion polls show that about 67 percent of Germans have said they would vote for the charismatic Illinois senator Barack Obama though they also admit that they know little about his foreign policy ideas.

As for his Republican competitor John McCain, Germans see him as being both more confrontational with other major powers and more uncompromising in dealing with states like Iran, Syria and Cuba, the German news weekly Der Spiegel said.

However, German analysts apparently agree at the moment that both McCain and Obama would make more demands on their European allies. And what Germans worry about most is that the next US president would press Germany to share more of the burden in Afghanistan.

(Xinhua News Agency June 12, 2008)