WASHINGTON, D.C. — On the last day of her working visit in the US capital, President Arroyo had a hastily arranged meeting with US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton, which surprised even her close aides.

The President met Clinton behind closed doors in her suite at the Willard Hotel here on Friday afternoon (Saturday morning in Manila), before she departed for New York City for the second leg of her US tour.

The dialogue came a day after President Arroyo reaffirmed the Philippines’ close economic and security ties with the United States during a historic meeting with US President Barack Obama at the White House.

A number of senior government officials accompanying the President in her US journey, however, were clueless about the meeting between the visiting Philippine leader and Clinton, which was not included in the President's official itinerary in Washington, D.C.

Shortly after the President’s meeting with Clinton, Philippine Ambassador to Washington Willy Gaa said he did know what transpired in the dialogue as he quickly rushed out of the hotel. Gaa was the note-taker in the President’s earlier meeting with US President Barack Obama at the White House.

When asked for details, Press Secretary Cerge Remonde insisted that the meeting between the two leaders scheduled for Friday was supposed to have been cancelled.

Remonde said it was too soon for the President and Clinton to meet again since they met for half an hour at the US State Department headquarters last February. He also said Foreign Affairs Secretary Alberto Romulo had a lengthy talk with Clinton at the sidelines of the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN) summit in Phuket, Thailand last week.

“There is no more meeting between the President and Secretary Clinton for two reasons. They met already when the President was here. Secretary Clinton and Secretary Romulo just met in Phuket one week ago.  More or less the issues they need to discuss were already both discussed in the meeting between Secretary Clinton and President Arroyo a month or so ago,” he told reporters here.

Remonde also said the United States wanted to reinvigorate its relations with Asia under the Obama administration as mentioned by Clinton recently. “The US is back in this part of the world because for a while really in the previous administration, nawala sa US radar screen ang Asia,” he said.

Executive Secretary Eduardo Ermita, a member of the President’s official party, said he was also unaware about the meeting with Clinton.

Ermita, regarded as the Little President, usually knows every detail of the President's engagements until this time with Clinton.