UK's Blair takes credit for pushing Africa, climate

By Katherine Baldwin

HEILIGENDAMM, Germany (Reuters) - Leaving his final summit meeting with world leaders, British Prime Minister Tony Blair can claim credit for pushing Africa, poverty and climate change up the international agenda.

Deals on global warming and aid struck by the Group of Eight nations fell short of Blair's dream outcome and campaigners' demands, prompting critics to deride his supposed leverage over U.S. President George W. Bush.

But the fact those issues dominated talks in Germany and that Bush committed to a global climate deal -- albeit without targets -- are testament in part to Blair's dogged determination and persuasive powers, analysts and officials said.

The Iraq war, however, will inevitably overshadow his legacy when he resigns on June 27 after a decade in power, they added.

"Climate change is one of those areas where his constant nagging of Bush has brought results," said Blair biographer and political commentator Philip Stephens.

"There is a perception that people, and not just Bush, do actually listen to him even if they don't agree with him."

Blair put climate change firmly on the agenda at the G8 summit he chaired in Gleneagles, Scotland, in 2005.

His alliance with German Chancellor Angela Merkel before this year's G8 put Bush on the spot and helped tie him into international efforts to combat climate change, Stephens added.

White House spokesman Tony Fratto said Blair had been a "strong leader" on the issue: "He (Bush) listens to the prime minister and very much appreciates his work on climate change."

Skeptics, though, said Bush's move on climate change was not the "major step forward" hailed by the prime minister. They argued Blair had got nothing in return for his close alliance with Washington, which proved highly damaging for him over Iraq.

"The Americans have abused him quite extraordinarily. He has got nothing in return," said George Joffe, a research fellow at Cambrige University's Centre of International Studies. "Mr Blair has been prepared to modify his policies to suit the Americans."

JOINT EFFORT ON AFRICA

On Africa, analysts said the double act of Blair and his finance minister and imminent successor Gordon Brown had made a significant impact on aid and debt relief -- helped by their media-savvy courting of rockstars Bob Geldof and Bono.

"In some ways he can reasonably claim that under his urging the issue (of world poverty) was pushed to the top of the agenda more than it would have been otherwise," said Michael Cox at London-based think-tank Chatham House.

But analysts agreed that Iraq had tarnished Blair's legacy and hampered his negotiating capacity on the world stage.