Prodi sees little poll impact on US-Europe ties

LONDON, Nov 6 (Reuters) Relations between Europe and the United States will not change dramatically before President George W Bush leaves office, regardless of tomorrow's congressional polls, Italian Prime Minister Romano Prodi said.

With surveys showing Democrats set to win control of the House of Representatives and possibly the Senate, European leaders are watching to see if an uncooperative legislature will force foreign policy changes on Bush.

But in an interview with Reuters today, Prodi played down suggestions that Bush, whose second and final term expires in January 2009, would become a lame duck leader.

''Nothing will substantially change in the next two years, the administration will be the same and I don't think that now we will have a major change (towards Europe),'' the Italian leader and former head of the European Commission said.

Widespread public dissatisfaction with Bush's leadership and the war in Iraq, where more than 2,800 US military personnel have died since the invasion in March 2003, have eaten away support from Republicans ahead of the election.

Prodi and many other European leaders strongly opposed the war in Iraq as unjustified, leading to deep strains in transatlantic relations that have not yet fully recovered.

Since his election in April, Prodi has begun to withdraw Italian troops sent to Iraq by his fervently pro-Bush predecessor, Silvio Berlusconi.

Describing relations between Italy and Washington as ''very good and very clear'', Prodi suggested popular disenchantment with Bush's policies would have more impact than the loss of the US Congress to the Democrats.

''We are seeing a different debate inside American society, especially concerning Iraq. Public opinion is quickly changing and from this point of view the president will have a big challenge, not really because of the change in the Congress.'' Under the US constitution, the president determines foreign policy but Congress has influence through oversight committees and the control of spending.

Reuters DH VP0215