As Foreign Minister Frank-Walter Steinmeier arrives in Washington to meet his counterpart Condoleezza Rice on Tuesday, German newspapers are speculating that Berlin is better placed to influence US policy than it has been in years -- not least because George W. Bush has been weakened by growing domestic opposition to his policies in Iraq and at home.

The left-wing Berliner Zeitung thinks the US government is pleased that Steinmeier chose to visit Washington before Moscow. In recent years, the United States has learned that Germany is no longer run by people whose principal sentiment towards America is gratitude, writes the newspaper. Former chancellor Gerhard Schröder's administration was made up of people who protested against the Vietnam War and the stationing of nuclear missiles on German soil. With Schröder now gone, Washington is hoping for a bit more good will from Berlin under Chancellor Angela Merkel, a conservative eastern German whose political roots lie in the fall of the Berlin Wall rather than the student protests of the 1960s.

"No one in Washington expects Berlin to send soldiers on missions in Iraq. What they're primarily hoping for is a different, better gut feeling," writes the Berliner Zeitung. "…a more positive sentiment through which shared goals can be identified." That means Steinmeier's discussions with Rice are likely to focus on areas of agreement such as Germany's military missions in the Balkans and Afghanistan, and on the possibility of greater German involvement in the Middle East peace process, writes the paper. Turkey's bid to join the EU, an issue on which Washington and Berlin don't agree, is unlikely to be discussed.

Business daily Handelsblatt expects a better atmosphere between the two governments but sees little concrete change in how they co-operate. "Merkel has gained trust because she didn't distance herself from the United States during the Iraq war," writes the paper. She has already pledged to improve ties with the United States and smaller European Union member states, thereby signalling a break with Schröder's "axis" of close relations with France and Russia. "That is just what the US government wants to hear," writes Handelsblatt. "If you put your ear to the ground in Berlin and Washington these days you can hear the rhetoric of a new beginning." Controversy over the CIA flights won't burden Steinmeier's visit, writes Handelsblatt.

Liberal Süddeutsche Zeitung takes a decidedly more critical tone. How times have changed between the Berlin airlift of 1948-49, when the US defied a Soviet blockade by supplying the grateful West Berliners with food and coal, and the recent reports of CIA flights transporting terrorism suspects, writes the paper in an editorial headlined "The CIA Airlifts." "The Berlin airlift won the US a lot of sympathy in the West, an asset that cannot be overestimated and which eventually helped it beat an inhuman system," writes Süddeutsche. "In the fight against terrorism the US government has opted for the losing strategy of its former foe: cold repression."

Süddeutsche also criticizes Arab leaders for failing to show up for the Barcelona EuroMed summit between EU leaders and "Partners of the Southern Mediterranean" – Algeria, Egypt, Israel, Jordan, Lebanon, Morocco, Palestinian Authority, Syria, Tunisia and Turkey. Only Palestinian President Mahmud Abbas came to Barcelona.

"They didn't want to face the Europeans' questions on fighting terrorism, on Israel, on democracy and human rights," writes Süddeutsche. The states of North Africa and the Middle East need to tackle the problems of terrorism and immigration just as much as Europe does. "Because neither side can do that without the other, there is no alternative to  partnership," opines Süddeutsche. Maybe it's time for Europe to attach conditions to its annual payout of three billion euros to its Mediterranean partners, concludes the paper.