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  • G20 summit: Obama to arrive amid 'huge razzmatazz'

    London (PTI): Embarking on his first overseas trip as the U.S. President, Barack Obama will arrive here on Tuesday for the G20 summit amid "huge razzmatazz", with an entourage of 500 staff, an armour-plated limousine and a fleet of decoy helicopters.

    Mr. Obama is visiting Britain for the first time and a White House cavalcade complete with armoured limousines, helicopters, 200 U.S. Secret Service staff and a six-doctor medical team will also station here during his trip, The Observer reported on Sunday.

    More than 500 officials and staff will accompany Mr. Obama, along with a mass of high-tech security equipment, including the $300,000 Presidential limousine, known as 'The Beast' which is fitted with nigh-vision camera, reinforced steel plating, tear gas cannon and oxygen tanks, the report said.

    In addition, a team from the White House kitchen will travel with the President, who will arrive here on Tuesday amid huge razzmatazz, it said.

    But it will be his closed-door meeting with world leaders that are likely to prove the most significant of the trip, it said.

    Mr. Obama will step out from the U.S. presidential jet, Air Force One, at Stansted airport. The Boeing 747-200B is fitted with its own gym, electronic defence units and shielding to protect its complete communication devices from radiation from nuclear blasts.

    Mr. Obama will then be flown to central London in a VH-3D helicopter known as Marine One.

    At the end of the week Obama and his massive retinue will head off for meetings in France, Germany and Czech Republic, although not before he has indulged in an unprecedented whirlwind of diplomatic activity — he and his advisers will not just be involved in complex summit negotiations, but will also be camped out HERE conducting a series of individual high-level mini-summits with the most powerful world leaders.

    Mr. Obama is far from alone in dealing with his intense schedule. At his London "diplomatic base camp" will be an array of the best and the brightest from his new administration. Chief among them will be Hillary Clinton, Secretary of State and the public face of American diplomacy.

    His chief of staff, Rahm Emanuel, will also be travelling to London on Air Force One. Obama's economic team includes Larry Summers, head of the National Economic Council, and Christina Romer, chairman of the Council of Economic Advisers.

    On Wednesday, Mr. Obama will hold his first bilateral talks with President Hu Jintao of China. Subsequently he will meet Russia's President Dmitry Medvedev.

    Subjects up for discussion will include ways to cooperate to limit Iran's nuclear ambitions and debate over plans for a U.S. missile shield that Russia views as a hostile act.

    Earlier in the day, Mr. Obama will have a breakfast meeting with Prime Minister Gordon Brown.




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