The same was asked on the streets, where answers were less sophisticated, but no more reassuring for the President.While polls show far fewer people professing support for Ms Lewinsky than for Mr Clinton (before yesterday's statement), his rating is falling. And, unusually, Mr Clinton declined to take questions.The appearance had been set up with care. It was not the Clinton of last Thursday, who denied the allegations to a television interviewer, looking worried, downcast and bereft of power. That was the much-criticised appearance he had to counter.But neither was it the Clinton who plays to the camera in all naturalness, gladhands his supporters and looks straight into the eyes of the people he talks to. He appeared to be perspiring, he had bags under his eyes, his voice was throaty and at one point seemed to tremble.A late night spent preparing his State of the Union address, the policy statement that opens the new year session of Congress, was the proffered explanation. This made the double point that he was tired, but not from worry, and that it was business as usual But it did not fully convince.

His legal advisers reportedly counselled silence until the extent of Ms Lewinsky's charges was known. But, by yesterday, silence had become politically untenable.Yet the Clinton who appeared in the Roosevelt room at the White House yesterday morning was not the Clinton of old. Four days later Ms Lewinsky gave her sworn denial of an affair with the President. Her lawyer, William Ginsburg, said that he had "submitted to prosecutors a summary of what she is prepared to testify".This opens the way for a possible retraction of her denial in return for immunity from prosecution for perjury.In another apparent attempt to show the White House is in control, Mr Clinton's lawyers asked a federal judge to bring forward Paula Jones's sexual harassment hearing from the scheduled date of 27 May, saying that allegations that Mr Clinton had sex with a White House intern called for a "speedy resolution".The unequivocal denial was what Mr Clinton's supporters had been waiting for. The last recorded time was on 3 January when she was denied entry. CBS reported that she "threw a fit" and screamed "Don't you know who I am?".Mr Clinton was travelling outside Washington at the time. CBS news reported that Ms Lewinsky had visited the White House at least four times last month including evenings and weekends, after she had ceased to work there.

As Mary Dejevsky reports, this was a high-risk gambit that places Mr Clinton's presidency on the line. Bill Clinton appeared angry, tired, and almost desperate. He jabbed his finger repeatedly at the assembled reporters and spoke with deliberate slowness. "I want to say one thing to the American people," he announced hoarsely "I want you to listen to me I'm not going to say this again. I did not have sexual relations with that woman, Miss Lewinsky I never told anybody to lie Not a single time Never. These allegations are false, and I need to go back to work for the American people." Later in the day, however, reports emerged to cast doubt on Mr Clinton's denial. In a fighting statement from the White House, President Bill Clinton rejected all the allegations against him as false and said he did not have sexual relations with Monica Lewinsky, the White House trainee, nor did he tell her to lie.

"There is a need for an urgent review of the relationship between export credit guarantees and arms export policy," he said.A spokesman for the Export Credit Guarantee Department said: "Once you have given your guarantee you can't do much about it, but the expectation is that all that money will come in." Even if the government had to pay out, it would hope to recoup the money when the Asian economy improved.. Malaysia now has more than pounds 200m in outstand- ing loans and its economy is in dire straits.The taxpayer also underwrote the pre-Gulf War sale of arms to Iraq, which led to an inquiry by Sir Richard Scott; Saddam Hussein's regime never paid the pounds 630m bill. Nigeria, which is well behind with its payments, owes pounds 1.6bn. The outstanding debts also cover an oil refinery in Thailand, which owes pounds 150m, and power stations in the Philippines and Singapore, which owe pounds 600m and pounds 350m respectively.Menzies Campbell, the Liberal Democrat defence spokesman, said he believed the debts would almost certainly remain unpaid.

When the High Court ruled against this, export credits were granted instead. More than one-third of the money was spent on British weapons, and further deals including the pounds 300m sale of 16 Hawk jets to Indonesia will still go ahead. The sale will complete a pounds 1bn order for 40 aircraft, which campaigners say have been used in occupied East Timor. Indonesia owes Britain pounds 1.8bn, pounds 800m of which is for arms, and its currency has fallen by 75 per cent against the United States dollar since last July.The total owed is enough to pay Britain's housing bill for two years or to run all the public services in Wales for a year.The revelation has sparked new calls for a review of export credit guarantees, which have been linked to more than one major scandal.