Former New York Mayor Rudolph Giuliani is preparing to run in the 2008 presidential election. He is setting up an "exploratory committee", the first step in any presidential bid, officials from Mr Giuliani's Republican party say.
Mr Giuliani shot to national prominence after the 11 September 2001 attacks on the World Trade Center in New York. He is known as a moderate Republican who supports gun control, same sex civil unions and abortion rights.
Being mayor, even in a city as big and important as New York, is not commonly regarded as normal preparation for a presidential campaign. But for Rudolph Giuliani everything, including his own political ambition, changed on 11 September 2001.
In the chaos which followed the terror attacks on the World Trade Center, Mr Giuliani emerged as a defiant and unifying leader, earning him the honorary, wholly unofficial title of America's mayor.
Since then Mr Giuliani has remained in the public eye and has remained popular with the American people, particularly Republicans. That said, Rudolph Giuliani's relatively moderate views may make it difficult for him to persuade mainstream Republicans that he should be their presidential candidate.
His support for same sex civil unions and embryonic stem cell research would put him to the left of most of his party members.
To win the nomination, Mr Giuliani will have to overcome a tough Republican field which seems likely to include, among others, the Arizona Senator, John McCain, and the Governor of Massachusetts, Mitt Romney.
