BELFAST, April  11, 2023 (BSS/AFP) - President Joe Biden is spending only
one night in Northern Ireland and limiting his meetings with UK and local
leaders to a minimum, before he goes on a nostalgia trip to his ancestral
homeland.

 But Downing Street denies any snub.

 Unabashedly touting his Irish-American roots ahead of a likely reelection
run, the president is according Prime Minister Rishi Sunak a mere "bi-latte"
coffee meeting rather than a full bilateral in Belfast, according to a US
official quoted by the New York Times.

The Democrat is also skipping next month's coronation of King Charles III,
dispatching First Lady Jill Biden in his place.

  But Downing Street points to a recent political summit in California and
Biden's acceptance of Charles's invitation to pay a state visit, as proof that
the transatlantic relationship is alive and well, even if UK officials balk at
calling it "special" anymore.

"You've seen the president's actions during his time demonstrate that we
have a close relationship," Sunak's spokesman told reporters on Tuesday.

  He noted that as president, Biden's first visit outside North America was
to the UK.

"We continue to have an incredibly positive working relationship with the
president and the US government."

 Nevertheless, the Biden administration has been widely seen as keeping
London at arm's length as the UK struggles to carve out a new role since
quitting the European Union.
       
       - 'Keep the peace' -
    
       
 The UK's hopes for a post-Brexit US free trade deal appear dead for now,
with the government settling for lower-grade agreements with individual US
states that are of more symbolic than commercial value.

 The White House made little effort to hide its frustration at the
name-calling and brinkmanship that characterised London's dealings with
Brussels under Sunak's predecessor, Boris Johnson.

 Sunak appears to have turned the page on the UK's relations with the EU by
forging a new pact on post-Brexit trading arrangements for Northern Ireland,
called the Windsor Framework.

 But the territory's biggest pro-UK party refuses still to end its more than
year-long boycott of the local government in the Stormont assembly.

 Before delivering a speech in Belfast Wednesday, Biden is expected to meet
briefly with the leaders of the Democratic Unionist Party and others including
the nationalist Sinn Fein, which wants reunification with the Republic of
Ireland.

 On leaving Washington, Biden said his main focus in Belfast was ensuring
the Good Friday peace agreement and Windsor Framework "stay in place".

"Keep the peace. That's the main thing," he told reporters.

 US political support was key to the peace agreement that ended the
three-decade-long "Troubles" in Northern Ireland in April 1998.

 But while Bill Clinton worked the phones to help secure the peace deal in
1998, Biden is viewed with distrust by Northern Ireland's pro-UK politicians
given his invocations of his Irish heritage.
       
       - Another Kennedy -
       
 Twenty-five years on, UK and some Northern Irish leaders hope for an
infusion of US economic support to safeguard the peace through investment, even
if Stormont's power-sharing government remains in paralysis.

 Sectarian strife has not gone away. Ahead of Biden's trip, masked youths
hurled petrol bombs and fireworks at police during an unauthorised nationalist
parade in Londonderry/Derry, where the Troubles began in the 1960s.

 But the president's delegation -- which includes Joe Kennedy, his newly
appointed envoy for Northern Irish economic affairs -- will also see the fruits
of the peace agreement.

 Biden's five-star hotel in Belfast only opened in 2018, part of a wave of
redevelopment that has transformed the city centre after its tragic recent past.

 Before 1998, the only place for visiting dignitaries to stay was the nearby
Europa, which was attacked so often by the Irish Republican Army paramilitary
group that it became known as the most bombed hotel in Europe.

  Chris Heaton-Harris, Sunak's secretary of state for Northern Ireland,
denied that the short duration of Biden's visit was a missed opportunity.

 "I know he also wants to visit other things in Ireland and family," he said.

 "But let's make the most of his visit and make it a really positive event
on the trajectory of Northern Ireland's continued peace, stability, and
actually prosperity as well."