In preparation for Monday's event, White House and State Department officials have held marathon sessions deciding niggling details that could mean the difference between a seamless diplomatic minuet and a protocol catastrophe.

Mr. de Klerk's concession on the writing of a constitution was hidden behind some of the most belligerent language he has aimed at Mr. Mandela's congress during their two-year diplomatic minuet.

The arrest of the four, who have been pursued by Tokyo for two decades, came after an intricate legal and diplomatic minuet.

His effort was part of an elaborate and quickening diplomatic minuet among leaders from America, Europe and the Arab world as war appears increasingly likely.

Either something very important will happen in the arms talks that resume today in Geneva or the talks will soon dissipate into the usual diplomatic minuet.

In a precisely choreographed diplomatic minuet, British negotiators were scheduled to begin talks on a new air treaty in Washington on Monday on the assumption that Washington's terms would be acceptable.

But the stakes have grown too high for this diplomatic minuet; the risk of war spreading to Macedonia grows frighteningly real.

It was a practiced step in this three-cornered diplomatic minuet.

Early Thursday morning, as the leaders there took up the thorny issue of climate change, he continued the diplomatic minuet, meeting with President Hu Jintao of China.

And only if the diplomatic minuet succeeds should we consider a cease-fire for the sole purpose of returning Iraqi forces home.