Posted on 02/01/2005 3:30:04 PM PST by Cornpone
PARIS, Jan 31 (AFP) - The Iraqi elections showed "the strategy of terrorist groups partly failed," French President Jacques Chirac told his US counterpart George W. Bush by telephone Monday, officials in Paris said.
The Sunday poll was "an important stage in the political reconstruction" of Iraq, Chirac told Bush in the 15-minute conversation, according to presidential spokesman Jerome Bonnafont.
The French leader said the turnout and technical organisation of the elections was "satisfactory," he added.
Between 60 and 75 percent of registered voters were estimated to have cast ballots. The result of the elections would not be known for several
days.
Chirac reiterated that France was ready to "cooperate with Iraq, especially by training security forces and senior civil servants." Paris has refused US pressure to carry out such training in Iraq itself, however.
After the elections, the focus in Iraq should be "including all groups that have renounced armed struggle" and drafting a constitution, Chirac said.
Bonnafont said that Chirac also took the opportunity to say to Bush that he was looking forward to seeing him over dinner when the US president visits Brussels February 21.
Paris and Washington have been making efforts of late to smooth over the dispute caused by the US-led invasion of Iraq. Relations are now cordial if tepid.
French Foreign Minister Michel Barnier told the Europe 1 radio station Monday that he and the rest of Chirac's government "don't regret anything" over the way they acted in relation to the war.
"We said what we believed and we are looking straight ahead," he said. He added that the Iraqi elections "were a victory for the Iraqi people and a first important step, which is indispensable for democracy and for the political process that we want to see and towards which we - I'm speaking of the international community - have been working for months."
But he also stressed that they now laid the ground for US and other foreign troops to leave Iraq.
"Frankly, the Americans want to exit this tragedy, this situation where their soldiers are dying," Barnier said.
The French media conceded that Bush had reason to feel triumphant over the elections.
The conservative Le Figaro daily said the US president was "the big winner" simply because the polls were carried out at all, despite the violence gripping Iraq.
It asked itself whether the polls would allow "the Americans to discover the beginning of an exit strategy?"
"Ignorant of the world and blinded by their power, the Americans often only arrive at the right solution after having exhausted all the alternatives," Le Figaro said, paraphrasing Winston Churchill.
Liberation, a left-leaning newspaper, also hailed Sunday's polls, saying the strong turnout revealed the insurgents as "a violent minority whose power to persuade or intimidate is exerted only on part of the Sunni minority."
It said the task of the new Iraqi leaders should be to organise the rapid withdrawal of the foreign forces in their country because "more and more, they are part of the problem rather than the solution."
Chirac, the EU Napoleon, should just STFU. Coward maggot.
"....Ignorant of the world and blinded by their power, the Americans often only arrive at the right solution after having exhausted all the alternatives," Le Figaro said, paraphrasing Winston Churchill. "
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Unbelievable. This is wrong on many levels.
You got that right. The first level is calling Chirac's comments congratulations. Its a pure insult.
Funny, I don't recall the Iraqis asking the French to "train" them in the proper etiquette of waving a white flag...
2155th, 384th, 381st, Skybird
"French Foreign Minister Michel Barnier told the Europe 1 radio station Monday that he and the rest of Chirac's government "don't regret anything" over the way they acted in relation to the war.
"
If the Americans had listened to you, it would have never been possible for Iraqis to have a real election.
If we'd left when the French demanded there would already be 1,000,000 dead Iraqis in civil war.
"Chirac, the EU Napoleon, should just STFU. Coward maggot."
VERY well said!
I just started reading "America's Oldest Enemy: The story of America's disastrous 300-year relationship with France".
It's a must-read for anyone who wants to know just how treacherous our "dear allies the French" have been over the centuries. They are backstabbers, whether they happened to be Bourbons, revolutionaries, Jacobins, Bonapartists, republicans, Vichy, or socialists.
It started with France's terrorist attacks against New England and Ohio Valley American colonists, included Vichy traitors shooting at our soldiers in North Africa during WW II, and continues through today.
No wonder Gen. Patton said he would rather face two German divisions in front of him than have one French division behind him.
-George
I extend my middle finger toward the east, in recognition of Paris' efforts to aid and abet terrorism.
Maybe after a couple of years of occupation and re-education, the French will be ready to have free elections of thier own!
"We said what we believed and we are looking straight ahead," he said.
If they look anywhere else they'll see what asses they are.
That's when I would've hung up...
Screw the Frogs!!!
I'd rather not! ;-)
Can't argue with you on that one!
"The French Betrayal of America" by Kenneth Timmerman is also a good read.
Hey France, at least we arrive at a solution. You just sit in your own crap for centuries and think the drifting aroma is perfume.
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