WASHINGTON, Sept 3: President George Bush and Chinese President Hu Jintao have agreed to call off talks planned here for next week in light of the ravages of Hurricane Katrina, the White House said on Saturday.

“Both presidents agreed that, in the present circumstances, it was best not to have a meeting in Washington next week; and they agreed to reschedule the visit of President Hu to another mutually convenient time,” said Bush spokesman Scott McClellan.

The two leaders, who spoke by telephone, agreed to meet on the sidelines of the Sept 14-16 UN General Assembly, Mr McClellan said in a statement.

Wednesday’s visit would have been Mr Hu’s first to Washington since becoming his country’s supreme leader. He travelled to the US capital on a ‘coming out’ trip in May 2002 when he was vice president.

In their conversation, Mr Bush also thanked Mr Hu ‘for the sympathies of the Chinese people on the hardships suffered by Americans in the aftermath of Hurricane Katrina’, said the spokesman.

China will offer five million dollars to the United States to help post-Katrina relief efforts, state media reported Saturday.

Beijing will also send rescue workers to the stricken areas along the US Gulf Coast, foreign ministry spokesman Qin Gang told the Xinhua news agency.

The decision by Mr Bush and Mr Hu postpones what could have been a contentious summit dominated by tensions over trade, political and strategic issues.

The two sides had quarrelled over whether to hold it at the White House as a state visit with full ceremonial trappings, as China demanded, or more casually at Mr Bush’s Texas ranch or the Camp David retreat.

Chinese officials preferred Mr Hu against the backdrop of Washington landmarks ahead of his attendance at the UN summit to send the message that their leader was home on the world stage.

Washington, however, was worried a state visit would not go down well among Americans at a time of tensions with China over notably its military build-up and trade relations.

In the end the two countries had compromised on giving Mr Hu a 21-gun salute and a welcome on the White House south lawn, but to fall short of a full state visit.—AFP