LONDON, May 30 - The dollar jumped to session highs versus the euro and the yen in European morning trade on Friday after U.S. President George W. Bush said he was still committed to a strong dollar. Markets are increasingly jittery about comments from politicians on the greenback's recent weakness, and Bush's comments on Russian television caught a market on heightened alert ahead of the G8 meeting of world powers on Sunday. It was not clear if the comments from Bush -- who is expected to reiterate Washington's long-held strong dollar policy at the G8 meeting -- moved the currency market but dealers noted the greenback's jump came shortly afterward. "Euro/dollar followed dollar/yen jump, which may have been driven by what Bush said. But dollar/yen moved first," said a London-based trader.
By 0801 GMT the dollar peaked at $1.1845 per euro and 118.70 yen . It was up more than a quarter percent against the euro on the day and nearly two thirds of a percent on the yen. But it was still down from the previous session highs when it had staged a brief comeback from record lows against the euro hit earlier this week.//