SIMI VALLEY, Calif. -- Former Soviet President Mikhail Gorbachev, once viewed with suspicion by Ronald Reagan, received hugs, handshakes and a medal Monday from the former president, who called Gorbachev 'my friend.'
Reagan presented his former nemesis with the first Ronald Reagan Freedom Award during a special ceremony at the new Ronald Reagan Library in Simi Valley, the same city where last week jurors acquitted four white Los Angeles police officers accused of beating black motorist Rodney King.
In remarks prior to his formal address, Reagan said his 'prayers go out' to those families who suffered in the Los Angeles riots that followed the King verdicts.
During his formal remarks, Reagan described Gorbachev as 'a man whose shining legacy will live forever; a man of great energy and principle and strength; a worthy competitor and a reliable ally; a true world statesman.'
'I'm proud to call him my friend,' Reagan said.
Gorbachev, who with his wife Raisa and daughter Irina Virskaya is touring the United States for two weeks, said he and Reagan's common search for peace and freedom 'was not in vain.'
'We were able to make a difference,' Gorbachev said.
Reagan and Gorbachev first began corresponding in 1985. Over the next several years of Reagan's presidency, they met in Geneva, Reykjavik, Moscow, Washington and New York, and eventually signed documents that set in motion the process of nuclear disarmament.
'Even as we tackled difficult issues, we did so in an atmosphere of civility and mutual respect,' Reagan said. 'We could argue like the devil for an hour or two. But we always shook hands and parted friends.'
However, despite their successes abroad, each suffered criticism at home.
'A high price has had to be paid for the historically necessary emancipation of the many nations living in our vast country,' Gorbachev said of the changes in the former Soviet Union. 'To some extent it was inevitable.'
Besides presenting the Freedom Award to his former nemesis, Reagan also officially opened the Ronald Reagan Center for Public Affairs at the Library, which he said will be a meeting point for 'historians and history makers' who will 'hasten along that long dreamed of day when no one wields a sword and no one drags a chain.'
Both former leaders quoted well-known figures from each other's country. Reagan referred to the wisdom of Leo Tolstoi and Andrei Sakharov; Gorbachev spoke of the ideals of Franklin Roosevelt and Abraham Lincoln.
'The spirit of liberty, which in the words of Abraham Lincoln is the heritage of all men, in all lands everywhere, is inextinguishable,' Gorbachev said.
After the speaches, the Reagan library took on the air of an exclusive country club. An Airforce band played show tunes, and dignitaries and Reagan supporters lunched on sandwiches and lined up to have their photographs taken with the two leaders next to a chunk of the Berlin wall.
Outside the festivities, two men chatted with Secret Service personnel, asking for a chance to meet the famous former Soviet leader.
Niles Alvino and Mark Calloway, both blacks who had been at the Simi Valley Courthouse the day the King verdict was announced, said they wanted to invite Gorbachev to South Central Los Angeles to see firsthand the damage from riots that crippled the city after the officers were acquitted.
'I want to tell Gorbachev to have a look at Los Angeles to see if there's a possiblity of our country falling apart the way his did,' said Calloway, an engineer from Hawthorne. 'I would like to ask him what he would suggest we do.'
The two men said it was ironic that Reagan was inside talking about freedom while about 20 miles away community leaders were trying to come to terms with racism and poverty that have limited oportunities for minorities.
'The present circumstances we face today are a direct result of Ronald Reagan and his racial policies,' said Alvino, a contract consultant from Woodland Hills.
