This story is about British Prime Minister Tony Blair announcing his retirement. initially i was looking at Iran’s reaction to the news, but i was unable to locate other articles that took that angle on the story…

The Sydney Morning Herald  and The Age (11.5.07)

The departure of British Prime Minister Tony Blair could have a “positive impact” if the country changes its foreign policy, Iran’s foreign minister says.

Britain under Blair has been a close ally of US President George W Bush in Iraq and also in efforts to isolate Iran over its nuclear program, which the West suspects is aimed at developing atom bombs

Bilateral relations between Tehran and London hit another low in March when Iranian forces seized 15 British naval personnel in the Gulf. They were released unharmed almost two weeks later.

Iranian Foreign Minister Manouchehr Mottaki said Blair’s announcement on Thursday he would step down next month after a decade as prime minister would be a “break for the Labour Party and the hard situation” they are facing.

“If there will be a correction to some extent … in their foreign policy … then definitely it can have positive impact as a possible factor in the foreign policy in some fields such as Iran,” Mottaki said on state television late on Thursday.

I found it interesting that i wasnt able to locate any articles in the New York Times about Iran’s reaction to Blair’s retirement because this paper has a more objective standpoint. An article relating to Blair’s retirement was focused on the positive relationship between US Presidet George Bush and Mr. Blair

Shoulder to shoulder at the White House for the last time before Blair steps down on June 27, the two leaders heaped praise on each other and defended themselves against critics of a war that is increasingly unpopular in both countries.

“There are a lot of blowhards in the political process,” Bush told a news conference. “Tony Blair is actually someone who follows through on his convictions.”

Blair returned the compliment, describing Bush as “a strong leader at a time when the world needs strong leadership.”

I am also finding it difficult to track down articles in Britain’s newspapers like the UK Gardian and Independent UK that are directly about Iran’s reaction… Although i did find an interesting article on the in the latter (May 10)  which slammed Tony Blair. Instead of talking about the retiring Prime Ministers positive qualities, the journalist, Steve Richards, compared Blair to Harold Wilson -

Much of his party feels betrayed by his long record in power. Many Labour members have left. Others can barely utter his name, such is their anger. For months leading up to the announcement the media has screamed about sleaze in Downing Street. Meanwhile his most senior cabinet minister waits to take over as a new Conservative leader makes waves.

Both leaders fell into traps, partly for similar reasons. Wilson might have avoided the humiliation of an enforced devaluation, but he wanted to show the media and business that a Labour government could run the economy competently. He was too scared to act in any way that conveyed a lack of confidence in the strength of the currency. Blair’s thinking in relation to Iraq was multi-layered, but partly he wanted to prove, after the vote losing 1980s, that Labour could work closely with a republican US president. Wilson and Blair strode towards disaster seeking to purge Labour of its past.

This article is pretty lenghthy and doesnt show Blair in a positive light at all, it suprised me that it so overtly expressed hatred toward Blair and didnt show an ounce of objectivity, Richards labels Blair as an ”insecure imposter.”

The Scotsman which is printed in the UK took a similar approach to the story as the New York Times- talking about the strong alliance between Bush and Blair

GEORGE Bush and Tony Blair yesterday staged their final double act of defiance, telling the world they would go to war again in Iraq if it was called for.

Mr Bush also heaped praise on the outgoing Prime Minister. The US president accused the media of trying to “tap dance on [Mr Blair's] political grave” by constantly questioning the point of yesterday’s meeting due to the fact that Gordon Brown will take over as Prime Minister by the end of next month.

He repeatedly came to Mr Blair’s defence, criticising reporters. He said: “You don’t understand how effective Blair is. Will I miss working with Tony Blair? You bet, absolutely. Can I work with the next guy? Of course.”

Mr Bush described Mr Blair as a “man of courage”, adding: “Tony Blair is someone who follows through on his commitments.”

The Regeneration & Renewal, (may 18) originating in the UK was on Blair’s positive side

The once young and fresh, latterly furrowed, face of Tony Blair so encapsulates this Labour government that it is difficult to separate his personal achievements from those of his administration in general Certainly, the past decade has seen a scale of physical change in the UK’s major cities arguably unprecedented since the rebuilding programme that followed the Second World War. Yet it would be wrong to apportion the revival of Manchester, the riverside renaissance of Newcastle and Liverpool and the turn-around of London from depopulated city to growing world metropolis to Blair personally.

‘Under Blair, there has been a decade of urban revival,’ says Dermot Finch, director of think-tank the Centre for Cities and a former Treasury economist who once worked with the Prime Minister elect, Gordon Brown. ‘But the main reason for that is a stable and relatively strong economy. It would have been very difficult to turn around those cities if the economy hadn’t been benign. We might have seen some physical change, but we wouldn’t have seen the increases in employment and income. With peaks and troughs, we’d have had more garden festivals maybe – not ten years of virtually constant improvement.’

i found there was a great mix of stories to come out of Blair’s retirement, especially from the UK’s perspective.  As i stated before i was trying to find out Iran’s reaction to his retirement because my topic is about Terrorism, however i could only find these types of articles in Australian newspapers.

The Iran Daily – May 6th

ASR-E EQTESAD: Tony Blair celebrated his last year in office as premier. The UK premier is the only Labour Party boss who managed to remain in 10 Downing Street for 10 years. After 18 years in the opposition camp and shadow government, the ruling party headed by its new leader (Blair) came to the political scene in 1997 under the so-called ’New Labor Party’ to distinguish itself from the leftist ideology of old Labour. Although Blair may have managed to secure a stable slot for himself in British history, he will always be remembered for and associated with the Iraq war. Blair is leaving in disgrace for no other reason other than his blind support for George Bush’s illegal invasion and occupation of Iraq. The drubbing his Labour Party has received at the hustling in recent years has more to do with his pathetic failures in occupied Iraq and for never having an exit strategy from the bloody conflict in which British troops are being killed on a regular basis.

i found there was a great mix of stories to come from Blair’s reitrement, especially from a UK perspective. this is perhaps because of the news value of Proximity. the Australian papers and New York paper are not as involved in this issue as the UK is, which is precisely why they have write from a more objective and distant position. i found Prominence also evident as the stories involve the British Prime Minister. Impact/consequence - the impact from Blair’s retirement not only on Britain but on Britains relations with Iran. timeliness - news organisations trying to get all angles of the story as it is unfolding. conflict – conflict was mainly present between the different UK publications, every newspaper had their own opinion of Blair and were overt in expressing it.