Chicago Tribune (CT) - WEDNESDAY April 1, 1987 Edition: CHICAGOLAND Section: NEWS Page: 7 Word Count: 700
George de Lama, Chicago Tribune

In his first state visit to the White House, France's conservative prime minister also sought and received assurances from Reagan that U.S. trade policy would not become more protectionist, according to a senior administration official.

The talks ended with announcement of agreement on AIDS research that resolved a sticky legal dispute over patent rights to a mass-marketed blood screening test for the disease, acquired immune deficiency syndrome.

"This agreement opens a new era in Franco-American cooperation, allowing France and the United States to join their efforts to control this terrible disease in the hopes of spreading the development of an AIDS vaccine and cure," Reagan said.

Under the accord, scientists from the Pasteur Institute in Paris and the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services agreed to donate 80 percent of the royalties they receive from sales of the blood test kits to a new joint international research center the two nations will establish in Washington.

The foundation also will raise private funds and donate 25 percent of its money to AIDS research efforts in Third World countries under the agreement outlined by Reagan.

Chirac called the agreement a "good step" toward fighting the disease.

Both French and U.S. scientists also have agreed to put aside their longstanding dispute over who first discovered the AIDS virus, now generally known as human immunodeficiency virus (HIV), and thus holds patent rights to the blood test kits that are sold around the world.

The battle over the patent has been waged in the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office, and the Pasteur Institute at one point filed suit in the U.S. Court of Claims. Now scientists from both nations will share the patent, U.S. officials said.

During their meeting Tuesday, Reagan and Chirac also turned their attention to U.S.-Soviet negotiations to reduce intermediate-range nuclear forces (INF) in Europe.

French officials had said the main purpose of Chirac's trip to Washington was to express France's concern that an agreement drastically reducing or eliminating INF missiles in Europe could leave the Soviets with a substantial advantage in short-range missiles aimed at Western European cities.

On the eve of his White House visit, Chirac had told reporters the French position on an arms control agreement, "Any agreement on intermediate-range nuclear forces should mention how equality can be achieved in short-range missiles."

A senior administration official briefing reporters at the White House after the two leaders' meeting said Reagan had assured Chirac that the U.S. would seek "an agreement that takes account of short-range missile systems."

Assistant Secretary of State Rozanne Ridgway, one of several Reagan aides who attended the meeting with Chirac, quoted the French leader as telling the President, "We have confidence in you."

On trade issues, Chirac expressed fears that the administration's decision to impose stiff duties on some Japanese products last week was a prelude to a new series of American protectionist measures, the official said.

Ridgway quoted Reagan as responding, "We don't want to go down that road."

The two leaders differed, however, on Chirac's proposal that grain- producing nations sell cut-rate grain to poor countries in Africa as a way of reducing surplus stocks.

One U.S. official described the idea as a "grain producers' OPEC" and said it conflicts with Reagan's goal of lessening government intervention in American agriculture and trade.

It was the second meeting between the two leaders but the first time Reagan met alone with Chirac, the former mayor of Paris and a conservative leader who shares power with Socialist President Francois Mitterrand in France's unique "cohabitation" government.

Last spring, both Chirac and Mitterrand attended the allied economic summit in Tokyo. But relations between the two French leaders have been strained of late and Mitterrand did not accompany Chirac to the U.S.

CAPTION: Photo: Prime Minister Jacques Chirac of France applauds President Reagan's remarks at a White House welcoming ceremony Tuesday. The two leaders discussed AIDS, trade and arms policy. Tribune photo by Paul F. Gero.

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