Powell's Remarks Harm Bolton's Chances of Un Job

The former US secretary of state Colin Powell has waded into the dispute over John Bolton, nominated to be the next US envoy to the UN, by expressing reservations to senators about Mr Bolton's suitability.

Mr Powell's intervention further damaged Mr Bolton's chances of Senate confirmation, which was postponed for several weeks after some Republican moderates had second thoughts over the outspoken conservative's reputation for bullying subordinates.

The affair also marks Mr Powell's most serious conflict with the White House since leaving the administration in January. His telephone conversations about Mr Bolton with two Republican senators, Lincoln Chafee and Chuck Hagel, were private, but Mr Powell's aides confirmed the calls had been made and let it be known that he had given Mr Bolton mixed reviews for his performance as an under-secretary of state in the administration's first term.

The aides told the Washington Post and the New York Times that his remarks had fallen far short of an endorsement, and had raised concern over his harsh treatment of more junior analysts and diplomats whose views did not match his own.

Mr Powell had already declined to sign a letter by seven other former secretaries of state endorsing Mr Bolton, and his former chief of staff, Lawrence Wilkerson, has told the New York Times that Mr Bolton would be an "abysmal ambassador".

Mr Powell's entry into the Bolton row is an embarrassment for President Bush, who gave the nominee his emphatic support on Thursday and dismissed resistance to the appointment as a partisan Democratic manoeuvre.

Mr Powell's clashes with Mr Bolton at the state department became common knowledge in the first four years of the Bush presidency. Unlike Mr Powell, the administration's sole multilateralist, Mr Bolton was a blunt sceptic over America's participation in international treaties, and a blistering critic of the UN.

After several diplomats came forward this week alleging that Mr Bolton had insulted them for holding differing views to him, support from Republican moderates on the Senate committee wavered, and Senator George Voinovich called for a postponement in the confirmation vote, asking for more time to study the nominee's past.

Joshua Micah Marshall, a liberal Washington commentator, suggested Mr Powell's quiet telephone calls "may well be fatal to Bolton's nomination".

"Republican senators looking to deny the White House this nomination need some partisan cover, and Powell just gave it to them."