PARIS, 28 July — As part of France’s continuing effort to mediate between Pakistan and India, French Foreign Minister Dominique de Villepin is to arrive in Islamabad on Aug. 3, after a stopover in New Delhi on Aug. 2.
A decision to play an important role in mediation between the two countries was taken by President Chirac last May in the wake of the terrorist killing of eleven French defense employees in Karachi on May 8. Although no firm agenda has yet been published, the French Foreign Ministry, however, did note at yesterday’s press briefing that the subjects to be dealt with in Islamabad “will concern our bilateral relations and the major international and regional issues of the day.”
French Defense Ministry sources say that discussion of the DCN contract for construction of the Agosta-90B submarines will be “high on the agenda” of the talks between De Villepin and his Pakistani counterpart. Ever since the terrorist attack on France’s nationals, calls have been made, notably in the French National Assembly to stop all military collaboration between the two countries. But President Chirac is understood to have indicated he wants not only to continue the collaboration but also step up relations between the two countries, perhaps offering Pakistan, according to an Elysee Palace source, “a more humane alternative” to the United States, as American pressure on Pakistan, notably with regard to taking part in the US global campaign against terrorism, has been perceived by France, in the words of the Presidential source, as being “a mite too heavy-handed.”
