French Block U.S. Bid on Trade Talks : But Kohl, Others Call Meeting in Bonn a Success

European leaders led by West German Chancellor Helmut Kohl labeled the 11th allied economic summit a success Saturday and minimized the “odd man out” position taken by French President Francois Mitterrand over starting a new round of trade liberalization talks.

Citing commitments by the seven major industrial democracies to common economic priorities of reducing inflation, lowering interest rates and enforcing greater budget discipline, Kohl declared: “This summit has brought important results. It was a summit of confidence, not of resignation.”

Stimulation Resisted

The chancellor, host for the summit, and his West European partners managed during the three days to resist any U.S. pressures to stimulate their economies, a move that the Americans have publicly declared to be necessary for global recovery but that the Europeans fear would trigger inflation.

British Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher commented that “unanimity was remarkable on the basic questions of economic approach and combatting protectionism” and that the argument with the French president over fixing a date for new trade talks “was small compared with the degree of agreement.”

Japanese Prime Minister Yasuhiro Nakasone had a particularly Japanese reason for satisfaction at the way the discussions of the last three days have gone. He said: “Before the summit there were ideas that the so-called Japanese problem might be the center of the discussion. This fortunately has proved to be untrue.”

Instead of leaning on the Japanese over their trade barriers, heads of government were mainly preoccupied with leaning on the French president on the question of a date for a new round of multilateral trade talks.

Both Kohl and Thatcher discussed--and argued--with Mitterrand several times in the three days on the trade talk issues to try to get him to agree to the simple common sense of setting a target date. But the French president would not be budged. Thatcher told her news conference:

“It was not for me to overpersuade someone who was not prepared to agree.”

In her bilateral talks with Mitterrand, the British prime minister said that protectionist pressures are most serious in the United States, and that it was in the interests of all the summit participants to help the Reagan Administration in fending off protectionist forces.

A Lofty Phrase

But Mitterrand told his news conference that “my responsibility is for France and for French agricultural producers”--a lofty phrase no doubt deliberately reminiscent of the late President Charles de Gaulle.

Thatcher, in her account of Mitterrand’s position, said:

“He took the view that whether there should be a new GATT (General Agreement on Tariffs and Trade) round by 1986 should be determined by GATT itself. We said yes, of course, and that includes the developing countries.

“But we are seven very important Western industrial countries, and it would help enormously if we gave a lead and undertook to get the preparatory arrangements through as quickly as possible and to try and influence others in the same direction. So the argument was really on a very narrow point, and I think that it is much more important that we are all conscious of the need to stop protectionism than this particular difference between us.”

Kohl at his news conference was almost dismissive of Mitterrand’s position and its effect on starting a new trade negotiating round.

“The train has left,” he said. “We are going to meet at GATT in Geneva in June and again in November. In the United States, there are drastic voices for protectionist measures. We don’t want them. We have tried to do something in this direction. The pressure of this thing will bring a conference.”

Even Mitterrand acknowledged that GATT preparations would move ahead, and the real explanation of his adamant stand here on the date question seems to lie in domestic politics. His agriculture minister, Michel Rocard, quit the government abruptly three weeks ago, and Mitterrand seems determined to make some high-exposure political gesture right now of “looking after the interests of French farmers.”

Mitterrand warns that a GATT negotiation could “undermine” the common agricultural policy of the European Community and the protectionism enjoyed by French farmers.

Early as January

At any rate, it was clear that France’s partners in the European Community are fully behind pressing ahead on the trade negotiations. British Chancellor of the Exchequer Nigel Lawson even spoke of starting negotiations, after summer preparatory work, as early as January.

For Kohl, there was particular satisfaction at the “statement of reconciliation” 40 years after World War II that was issued on Friday. He expressed satisfaction that it mentioned German reunification “for the first time” and said that “it is especially important that all partners called for this.”

Mitterrand added: “It is important that 40 years later, countries that have fought each other can understand each other as we have. It is important that this happened in Germany. Germany here had her friends around her.”