Rice heading home after bumpy British visit

US Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice was to head back from her trip to northwest England after a visit which shaped up as a public relations nightmare.

Anti-Iraq protests again dogged Rice and her host, British Foreign Secretary Jack Straw, throughout her two-day trip to his constituency of Blackburn, a dreary former mill town of 100,000 people best known as a footnote in a Beatles song.

Some 200 demonstrators posting banners proclaiming "War on terror, war on Islam" and "Bring the troops home" greeted the two as they arrived at the town hall Saturday to meet with local Muslim leaders.

At a joint news conference, Rice reacted to a statement by her host that the Guantanamo detention centre was "an anomaly," by saying the US would close the facility the day it was no longer needed.

FULL STORY