Cheney New EU, NATO entrants ''rejuvenate'' groups

DUBROVNIK, Croatia, May 7 (Reuters) US Vice President Dick Cheney lent support today to three Balkan states seeking to join NATO and the European Union, saying their entry would help ''rejuvenate'' the two Western clubs.

Cheney was speaking to a summit of the Adriatic Charter group, Croatia, Albania and Macedonia, in the picturesque port city of Dubrovnik as he wrapped up a five-day tour of ex-communist countries in transition to democracy.

He hailed the three countries for their willingness to undertake democratic reforms and described their involvement in US-led military operations in Iraq or Afghanistan as ''a very important step as well''.

''You who aspire to those organisations help rejuvenate it and help us re-dedicate ourselves to the basic and fundamental values of freedom and democracy,'' he said at the opening of the meeting.

Cheney's praise for the Adriatic leaders' efforts stood in marked contrast to the stinging rebuke of Russia he delivered to Baltic and Black Sea heads of state at the outset of his trip in Vilnius on Thursday.

Cheney made diplomatic waves at a time of increasingly chilly US-Russian relations when he accused President Vladimir Putin of backsliding on democracy and using Moscow's vast energy resources to ''blackmail'' its neighbours.

Russia brushed off Cheney's remarks as ''incomprehensible'', but lingering tensions between the two former Cold War rivals could bode ill for a G8 summit that it will host for the first time, in St Petersburg in July.

Further integration of Moscow's neighbours into Western alliances could compound its anger.

Many Russians worry the US push for global democracy is really aimed at achieving dominance in what they considered their sphere of influence before the collapse of the Soviet Union in 1991.

Croatia opened EU accession talks in October, hoping to join around 2009. It is also further along than its Adriatic Charter partners, Macedonia and Albania, in NATO aspirations.

The three signed the US-backed Adriatic Charter two years ago to boost their chances of joining the Western military alliance, after missing out on its two big eastward expansion waves that followed the fall of communism.

REUTERS OM KN1518