French President Sarkozy plans US holiday -paper

BOSTON, Aug 2 (Reuters) French President Nicolas Sarkozy is planning to take a summer vacation in the northeast United States, the Boston Globe reported today.

After years of strained relations between Washington and Paris following France's vocal opposition to the 2003 US-led invasion of Iraq, the administration of US President George W Bush is hoping for stronger relations with Sarkozy than with his predecessor Jacques Chirac.

The Boston Globe quoted David Owen, the town manager of Wolfeboro, New Hampshire, as saying local officials had met with the US Secret Service, which provides security for the US president, to plan for the visit.

Owen could not be reached today. Officials at the French Consulate in Boston did not immediately respond to calls for comment.

About 100 miles north of Boston, Wolfeboro is perched on the eastern end of Lake Winnipesaukee in the wooded middle of the Granite State.

Sarkozy is not the only foreign dignitary to vacation in New England. Gordon Brown, now British prime minister, has visited Cape Cod, the Massachusetts beach resort that is one of the preferred haunts of the US Kennedy family.

Last month, Bush hosted Russian President Vladimir Putin at a Bush family estate in coastal Kennebunkport, Maine.

Sarkozy took office in May. In his first months as French president, he has pushed through some fiscal stimulus measures at home and helped secure the release of six foreign medics who had been held as prisoners in Libya for eight years after being convicted of deliberately infecting Libyan children with HIV.

REUTERS SAM BST0056