Want us to take Turkey? You add Mexico

He asked: "If you are so keen on us letting the Turks into the EU, why don’t you let Mexico into the United States?" Bush deflected the rebuke by laughing, Danish sources said.

Several EU leaders, including Jacques Chirac, the French president, delivered tirades against the Americans at the summit dinner Thursday night.

The common refrain was that Washington was trying to force the pace for its own purposes, chiefly to secure Turkey’s vital air bases for the war against Iraq but also because it stands to gain from any weakening of Europe’s cohesion as a political bloc.

But there was even greater irritation with the "hardball" tactics of the Turks themselves, who said refusal to offer an early date for accession would be taken as evidence throughout the Muslim world that the EU was a racist Christian club.

Venting his fury at the dinner, Chirac accused the Turks of blackmail, adding: "It’s not enough to respect EU law. You have to be polite and civilized."

The leaked remarks prompted an angry riposte by Abdullah Gul, the Turkish prime minister who attacked the French for delaying the start of accession talks until December 2004.

"The real blackmail is what Chirac has done," he said.

Daily Telegraph