Statements made by the Ministry of Foreign and European Spokesperson (Paris, January 25, 2011)

Lebanon/ Appointment of the Prime Minister
Sudan
Côte d’Ivoire
Iran/ Nuclear issue

Lebanon/ Appointment of the Prime Minister

France takes note of the appointment of Najib Mikati by President Michel Suleiman in order to form a new Lebanese government.

It would like to commend the work of the national unity government led by Saad Hariri, following the exemplary democratic elections. It pays tribute to his courage, dignity and determination in carrying out his mission under particularly difficult circumstances.

The process of forming the government will begin. It must take place within the framework of the Constitution and the Taif Accords and reflect the independent and sovereign choice of the Lebanese people, without any interference and through dialogue.

We urge the future government to honor the international commitments made by Lebanon, notably with respect to the Special Tribunal for Lebanon.

While demonstrations are still taking place, France urges all parties to demonstrate restraint and to refrain from any use of violence.

Sudan

Q - The American government says that it wants to improve relations with Khartoum, particularly in the wake of a potential split with Southern Sudan. The Sudanese party indicates that this will be possible provided the arrest warrant for al-Bashir and two of his closest advisors - even a minister - is lifted. What would France’s position be regarding such a request?

Regarding the arrest warrant, our position is well-known: we support the International Criminal Court.

All this is hypothetical. Firstly, we are not talking about secession. We will, when the time comes and depending on the results which are not yet known, talk about the implementation of the results of the referendum. In this respect, our priority will be to help the Sudanese people to succeed in doing this, to see how we can truly help Sudan – such as it will emerge after the referendum – to move forward in the right direction.

I would also like to reaffirm that Mrs. Alliot-Marie stated in an interview that she gave in the last few days that “France calls for the continuation of discussions on the post-referendum issues and on the commitment to maintaining peace between the north and south, whatever the outcome of the referendum.”

We are monitoring this key issue very closely with our African partners, with the United Nations, with the Americans, with Qatar’s mediation with respect to the other issue relating to Darfur. Things have gone well until now and we hope that things continue in this direction. We will spare no effort to continue to work in this direction.

Côte d’Ivoire

Q - Regarding Côte d’Ivoire, I’m having a bit of trouble understanding how France’s position is consistent. Since the start of the crisis, you have been saying that we support the position of the Africans, etc. And then suddenly we have two statements, one issued by Mrs. Alliot-Marie, and one from the president, stating that we should, above all, not use force. Nigeria is going to ask the United Nations for a resolution authorizing the use of force. I don’t understand the lack of consistency. Does that mean that we are going to vote against a draft resolution?

Our position couldn’t be more consistent with regard to this situation. The starting point is the vote by the Ivorian people, the results of which were certified by the United Nations and recognized by the entire international community. What is the outcome? Mr. Ouattara is the winner of the election and is therefore the only legitimate president of Côte d’Ivoire. Secondly, given the situation that we have now, we are working in several directions. The first is that we support all of the efforts by the Africans, whether by the African Union or by ECOWAS, to ensure that a solution is found.

Q - So you support the Nigerians who are asking the United Nations to authorize the use of force?

We hope that the use of force will not be necessary and that Mr. Gbagbo will listen to the voice of reason, that he will finally heed what the Ivorian voters have stated, i.e. his own people, and will heed the appeals of the international community, beginning with the African countries whose efforts we support, whether those of the African Union or ECOWAS. There’s the consistency. We are also working in another direction, i.e. with respect to all of the economic issues, and beyond the economy, the first series of measures adopted by the Europeans, i.e. the visas, the visa ban list.

Finally I would like to reaffirm that in order to deprive Mr. Gbagbo of the financial resources that have allowed him until now to undermine respect for the results of the elections, the West African Economic and Monetary Union, the European Union and Côte d’Ivoire’s other external partners have taken economic and financial measures aimed at preventing the misappropriation of Côte d’Ivoire’s public resources.

The statements on the cocoa industry made yesterday by President Ouattara reiterate to the economic operators that they have a duty to enforce the use of the legitimate financial channels and to ensure that their activities do not finance activities that oppose lawfulness and democracy. France supports President Ouattara’s efforts in this direction and is consulting with its European Union partners, as indicated by Mrs. Ashton’s spokesperson yesterday.

Iran/ Nuclear issue

Q - According to the presidency, we need to strengthen the sanctions and France must now undertake an action or an initiative within the European Union or even the UN Security Council in order to achieve a new resolution?

The Six met with an Iranian delegation, led by Saeed Jalili, from January 21 to 22, 2011, in Istanbul for discussions focusing on the Iranian nuclear issue. During these two days we had a series of meetings with Iran, including a separate meeting on the Tehran Research Reactor (TRR).

The meeting in Istanbul followed on from the one in Geneva which took place from December 6 to 7, 2010, at the end of which we agreed, with the Iranians, to engage in technical and more detailed discussions in Istanbul on how to make progress towards a solution to the Iranian nuclear crisis.

France and its partners came to Istanbul with concrete proposals to help restore the Six’s trust with respect to Iran.

We put various ideas on the table, including an updated version of the offer on the TRR, as well as proposals on strengthening cooperation with the IAEA. The latter are a direct result of the UN Security Council resolutions and the demands presented by the IAEA director in his reports on Iran. By proposing these concrete measures we hoped to be able to establish a climate of trust in order to be able to engage, as quickly as possible, in serious and constructive dialogue that is likely to respond to the international community’s profound concerns regarding the Iranian nuclear program.

We didn’t set any preconditions for the discussions and we spared no effort to reach an agreement.

We hoped to have a constructive and detailed discussion on these proposals, but that quickly turned out to be impossible, given the preconditions that Iran set for the dialogue.

The Iranian representative did in fact set two preconditions: the public recognition by the Six of “Iran’s right to have a nuclear fuel cycle” and the lifting of international sanctions.

This boiled down to demanding that the Six reject the successive resolutions by the Security Council. These were not serious preconditions and were of course unacceptable to us.

In Istanbul, we hoped to engage in a discussion with Iran on concrete measures that would allow us to move forward. We did our utmost in this respect. We regret to note that the Iranian delegation’s attitude made this impossible.

The door is still open for discussions; it’s up to the Iranians to choose dialogue.

We remain convinced that a negotiated solution to this crisis is possible and we remain determined to do our utmost to achieve this.

Furthermore, in dealing with the Iranian nuclear issue, the Six have continuously remained faithful to the dual-track approach combining dialogue and firmness. Since Iran is continuing to refuse to engage in dialogue by setting unacceptable preconditions for the discussions, the question of strengthening the sanctions is being raised.

This was clearly stated by President Sarkozy who indicated that it was necessary to strengthen the sanctions.

We are notably discussing this with our 3+3 partners in association of course with Mrs. Ashton.
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