WASHINGTON, Jan 7 (AFP) - President George W. Bush announced Friday that he had chosen US Trade Representative Robert Zoellick to be the number two diplomat at the State Department, under secretary of state nominee Condoleezza Rice.
"Condi Rice and Bob Zoellick will form one of the really strong and capable foreign policy teams our country has ever had," the president said on the South Lawn of the White House, with both senior aides at his side.
Zoellick and Rice -- whom Bush has picked to replace departing Secretary of State Colin Powell --- worked closely together at the national security council under Bush's father, former president George Bush.
Both posts require Senate confirmation.
The announced quashed speculation that the president or Rice might pick John Bolton, the hard-line undersecretary for arms control, who has ruffled feathers with rhetorical broadsides at countries such as Cuba and North Korea.
If confirmed, Zoellick would replace Deputy Secretary of State Richard Armitage, who like Powell has resigned in the wake of the November 2 election in which Bush won a second four-year term.
Rice, 50, has served as Bush's national security adviser since he took office in January 2001. Zoellick, 51, has been US Trade Representative over the same period.
Rice is expected to announce replacements at other high-profile State Department posts either at her confirmation hearings, which open January 18, or shortly after she is sworn in.
The number three diplomat, US Undersecretary of State for Political Affairs Marc Grossman, is leaving, as are assistant secretary for European and Eurasian affairs Elizabeth Jones and undersecretary for economic affairs Alan Larson.
Assistant US Secretary of State for Near Eastern Affairs William Burns, who has served as Bush's special Middle East envoy and helped broker Libya's vow to give up weapons of mass destruction, may become US ambassador to Moscow, according to State Department sources.
Zoellick is a marathon runner who shares a passion for running with Europe's outgoing trade commissioner Pascal Lamy. The two used to jog together in Brussels in between hammering out accords on transatlantic trade wars.
He is also a free-trade advocate with two decades' worth of international negotiating experience.
Zoellick, who hails from Illinois, was educated at Harvard and launched his Washington career in 1985 at the Treasury Department then run by James Baker, who has become a close ally.
When Baker became secretary of state for the elder Bush, Zoellick became an adviser, also working alongside his prospective new boss, Rice.
He played a key role in negotiations after the reunification of Germany in 1990, defining the new country's relations with the four powers that had occupied Berlin since World War II. Germany gave him the Knight Commanders Cross, one of its highest awards, for his efforts.
01/07/2005 17:19 GMT - AFP