RAMALLAH, 30 June 2004 — French Foreign Minister Michel Barnier pledged Paris’s help to build an independent and democratic Palestinian state as he began controversial talks with Yasser Arafat in the Palestinian leader’s battered headquarters late yesterday.
“Our objective is to help you build an independent democratic and prosperous Palestinian state,” Barnier told reporters after a meeting with his Palestinian counterpart Nabil Shaath and before entering Arafat’s Muqataa compound for dinner.
“I have come to deliver the cordial greetings of the president of the French republic (Jacques Chirac) in these very different times.
“There is an active need to resume dialogue (with Israel) to revive the peace process with the well-known road map and that’s what I want to talk about with President Arafat tonight.”
Barnier and Shaath had earlier signed an agreement on technical and scientific cooperation which the chief French diplomat said represented a “concrete sign of trust and solidarity.”Shaath said that both sides wanted to advance the troubled road map peace plan which envisages the creation of a Palestinian state next year but has made next to no progress since its launch last year.
The Palestinian Authority wanted “to go forward with the peace process, to put an end to the violence and to work toward the creation of an independent Palestinian state which will be a force for stability in the region and an ally for France,” he added.
He praised Barnier for pushing ahead with his visit despite pressure from Israel on the European Union to boycott the veteran leader. “France is a proud country” for not giving into “straight Israeli blackmail,” Shaath earlier told AFP. “France is sometimes ahead of European policy. France is willing to stick its neck out, to do more than wait, and try to directly push peace forward.” Barnier’s visit to Ramallah comes after he held talks with Egyptian and Jordanian leaders in Cairo and Amman last week over Israel’s planned pullout from Gaza and from another four settlements in the northern West Bank.
