The total value of these assets is still unclear but diplomats put it at $500 million to $1 billion.

Western diplomats in Managua have put the figure at about twice that.

One Asian diplomat put the rate of increase at 40 percent.

Also, as a senior diplomat put it to me, "the march to federalism has stopped".

The diplomat had put the number of dead at 26,000, whereas Bangladesh says nearly three million were killed.

"What diplomat put the two of you on gangway duty together?"

One senior Western diplomat here put the odds of a military conflict at even or better.

By publishing our itinerary, the diplomats put members of Congress in danger.

"He still makes the political weather," as one Western diplomat put it.

He is, as one diplomat put it, "the only address in town."