It will be Albright on the night

Date: 30/01/1997

Madeleine Albright, the newly sworn-in US secretary of state, has impressed the Commission with her priorities so far - one of her first diary dates after taking office was a meeting with Dutch Foreign Minister Hans van Mierlo, currently president-in-office of EU foreign ministers.

Insiders believe it is no coincidence that Van Mierlo was invited to Albright's Washington office before NATO's Secretary-General Javier Solana, and although too much can be made of it, her priority list does contrast starkly with the pecking order set by her predecessor Warren Christopher, who made little pretence of his preference for NATO over the EU.

Foreign affairs watchers in Brussels are convinced that Albright could be forging a new 'special relationship' - until the next transatlantic trade dispute, that is.