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New York: US President George W Bush and Iraq war opponent German Chancellor Gerhard Schroeder on September 25 put their bitter 16-month rift behind and promised to work together to rebuild that nation.

Bush said, "The first thing that I told him, I said, look, we've had differences and they are over, and we are going to work together, and when Germany and America work together we can accomplish a lot of positive things."

Bush said the two nations will work together in Afghanistan. "I appreciate his efforts to help Iraq grow to be a peaceful and stable and Democratic country. We talked about Middle East. We talked about proliferation concerns. In short we talked about the things we can do together to benefit mankind and I am really happy we had this meeting today," he added.

Chancellor Schroeder said he would very much confirm what Bush said that the "differences have been left behind and put aside now. We have both agreed that we want to look into the future together. And I would like to reiterate the fact that Germany has a very strong, in fact a vested interest, in a stable and very Democratic Iraq".

Schroeder said he has once more said to Bush how much Germany would like to come in and help with resources that the country has.

"We would very much envisage that we will assist in providing training for security staff, be it police function or be it some form of military function," Schroeder said.

PTI