sarkozy meets with mick jagger

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/africa/6930620.stm

sarkozy meets with mick jagger

? is "meets with" solely U.S. vernacular?

I think so - we would normally just say Sark meets Mick.

Would you always use a "with" in your neck of the woods?

not always, but a lot ... i guess "met" implies not having met before, and other things .... maybe not as formal. m-w.com says "met with" is as in "met with opposition", but look at all these examples:

http://www.google.com/search?hl=en&q=%22met+with%22