Regional Factbooks

France has an opportunity to participate strongly in the process to bring peace to the Middle East - but its politicians appear to be determined to maintain France's unfathomable policies to maintain political ties with Terrorist leaders in the Arab world. (Villepin's visit to Arafat in the last week of May 2003)

The Israeli - Palestinian peace process requires influential governments that will encourage and coerce each party to the international peace plan.

France, with its strong North African interests is well positioned to coerce the Palestinian side, whilst United States is using every effort to coerce the Israeli side. Without appropriate coercion behind the Palestinians, the current peace process is likely go the way of all previous attempts to resolve the most important political/religious issue of this millenium.

Will France lose its opportunity.............

Perfidy and Self Interest of France

In the aftermath of the overthrow of the Saddam's terror regime in Iraq by a US led coalition, there has been time to consider earlier opposition to the conflict led primarily by France.

Villepin's May visit to Arafat in Palestine would appear to be as counter-productive to the middle east peace process as its earlier opposition to the overthrow of Saddam Hussein's government.

Perfidy and self interest have long been acknowledged as attributes of French politicians, particularly emphasised by the actions of France's defense minister in the 'original' Gulf war in 1991.

In 1991, Jean-Pierre Chevenement, was president of the Iraq-France friendship society, and in his position as Minister of Defense, instructed his General in Iraq to report all strategic decisions of Norman Scharwzkopf, and Sir Peter la Billiere. In other times, Chevenement might have been rightly accused of spying for the 'enemy' and suffered the normal decision of military justice.....
( http://www.nejtillemu.com/chevenement.htm)

In 2000, Chevenement's sympathy with Saddam was reported as follows:-

In May 2003, the French government continues its support of terrorist regimes, now
with the malevolent face of France's Foreign minister Villepin.

A Nobel Peace Prize for the man who appears to have, almost single handedly, created the current Iraq/Saddam Hussein threat to world safety.

Has the world lost its reason....... ?

Report from the Rush Limbaugh Show Jacques Chirac & Saddam Hussein jointly developed Iraq's nuclear weapon capability?   February 19, 2003 On Tuesday night, I came across some explosive news about Jacques Chirac and Saddam Hussein on Stratfor.com. The news comes from the days when Chirac was mayor of Paris and the French premier, when he cultivated this outrageous personal relationship with Saddam Hussein. Three stories on this have come out, now. As the New York Times put it in 1986: "Chirac has said many times that he is a personal friend of Saddam Hussein." It's almost as if someone is angry with Chirac, so they're releasing the truth about the French PM and the man in Baghdad he calls "my dear friend." It may well be one of these European countries that he scolded, insulted and threatened in his tantrum the other day. Bulgaria has compared France's "bully tactics" to those of the USSR. Chirac is acting irrationally, and there has to be more about this here than geopolitics or Bush hate. These stories back up what I've been telling you lately: Chirac is blocking the liberation of Iraq because he doesn't want us to find out how much he personally - not France, but he - helped Hussein build WMDs. We already knew that they helped Saddam build that nuclear reactor which the Israelis took out in 1981. Now we have this letter from 1987, in which Chirac speaks in clouded language about helping Saddam rebuild that reactor and get weapons-grade uranium. You have to hear me read the details of all this in the audio link below. There's More to It Than France Violating the Arms & Trade Embargos Stratfor.com reports that what Chirac called his "close, personal relationship" with Saddam dates back to late 1974, when Chirac traveled to Baghdad and met the #2 man in Iraq: Vice President Hussein. During that visit, their main negotiation issue was Iraq's purchasing of nuclear reactors. In September 1975, Chirac personally took Saddam on a tour of a French nuclear plant. He expressed his desire to help Iraq with its nuclear program, and "the Iraqis bought a 70-megawatt reactor along with six charges of 26 points of uranium enriched to 93%." That's enough weapons-grade uranium to produce three to four nuclear devices. Baghdad also purchased a one-megawatt "research reactor," and France agreed to train 600 Iraqi nuclear technicians and scientists. France also agreed to sell $1.5 billion worth of weapons to Iraq - for which they got a lucrative oil contract. In 1987, the Manchester Guardian Weekly quoted Chirac as saying that he was "truly fascinated" by Hussein. This was Chirac's doing, on his own and separate from France's government. Former French President Valerie Giscard D'Estaing said exactly that in 1994. When President D'Estaing found out about this deal, he kyboshed it. In preparation for the 1988 presidential campaign, Chirac claimed he had nothing to do with that reactor destroyed in 1981. This gets Clintonesque! In August of 1987, French magazine Le Canard en Chain published excerpts of a letter from Chirac to Hussein. The magazine writes that the letter "speaks of the cooperation launched more than 12 years ago...for the sovereignty, independence and security of your country." This is amazing stuff - and it may just be the tip of the iceberg. It's almost as though Iraq is France's #1 trading partner for oil and weapons. Chirac knows these Inspector Clouseaus will never uncover any evidence of his personal hand in arming Saddam, which is why he wants them given endless amounts of time. If Chirac was involved with that reactor and trying to get 93% enriched uranium to Saddam, then there's evidence to prove it, which we'll find if we invade. This is one of the things he's obviously trying to hide. The so-called idea that "it's just the French and they're pacifists" or trying to seek power at the EU may be true, but it doesn't explain this irrational behavior and the temper tantrums by Chirac - this news does. Listen to Rush... (...blow the lid off Chirac's relationship with his "dear" friend Hussein) Read the Articles... (Stratfor.com: The Chirac-Hussein Connection) {Stratfor.com Requires Paid Registration to Read Its Articles} (NY Daily News: French roast has Sov taste, Bulgaria says) (The Herald: Chirac finding pro-US stances hard to stomach) (International Herald: News analysis: Chirac's outburst exposes contradiction within EU)

Source: Factbook.net