The Hindu : Reworking the Paris-London equation

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Wednesday, Apr 02, 2003

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Reworking the Paris-London equation

By Vaiju Naravane

France has decided to show restraint... Jacques Chirac too needs Tony Blair. France is afraid of being marginalised within Europe and NATO and fears economic repercussions.

MUTUAL NAME-CALLING is slowly giving way to tentative cooperation. Setting aside the blame-game, France and Britain are trying to mend fences, papering over their differences on the war in Iraq that resulted in extremely strained relations. Now both nations, although holding opposing views, are trying to forgive and forget, concentrating on areas where they feel they can continue to cooperate.

In a telephone conversation over the weekend, the French President, Jacques Chirac, and the British Prime Minister, Tony Blair, agreed that the United Nations should play a major role in post-war reconstruction in Iraq and that they "would work closely together" towards this end. The conversation came at a time when France with Belgium and Germany is planning to hold a mini European defence summit towards the end of April, a move bitterly opposed by Britain. Mr. Chirac has been one of the fiercest European opponents of the war and Mr. Blair has held him personally responsible for sabotaging a second Security Council Resolution that would have given U.N. approval for an invasion of Iraq.

With public opinion in Britain voicing concern over a post-war scenario in Iraq dominated by America, Mr. Blair needs all the support he can get within Europe to bolster his position vis-a-vis the U.S. President, George W. Bush. France has decided to show restraint although worldwide opposition to what can only be a prolonged war is mounting. It will not rub salt into British wounds by saying "I told you so". Instead, Mr. Chirac offered French condolences for Britain's war dead and said he hoped the war would be short, with as little damage as possible. Mr. Chirac repeatedly emphasised that the U.N. alone should administer Iraq and be in overall charge of reconstruction once the country falls, thus bolstering Mr. Blair's desperate calls for greater U.N. involvement.

Mr. Chirac too needs Mr. Blair. France is afraid of being marginalised within Europe and NATO and fears economic repercussions. The French Foreign Minister, Dominique de Villepin, expressed these concerns when he said the "U.N. must steer the reconstruction process. The U.N. must be at the heart of the reconstruction and administration of Iraq. The legitimacy of our action depends on it."

Already the French petroleum giant, Total-Fina-Elf, which has a long history of working with Iraq that goes back to 1927 when it discovered the Kirkuk oilfields, has expressed fears that the U.S. administration will try to shut it out of post-war contracts. There is talk that Sodhexo, a French agribusiness giant that provides rations for the U.S. army, might lose a contract that runs into millions of dollars. A rapprochement between French and British positions is clearly in the interests of both countries.

Meanwhile, anti-U.S. demonstrations in France appear to be winding down with fewer numbers turning up for anti-war demos — paradoxical, given the strong anti-war sentiment in France.

Images of civilian victims, contradictory statements by the coalition on the duration of the war, failure to uncover chemical or biological arms and the certainty that the conflict will drag on for months with terrible suffering inflicted on civilians, have strengthened French opposition to the war. Over 80 per cent of the French are against the conflict.

However, this fact is not reflected in the dwindling numbers of shouting protesters in French towns and cities. Flagging anti-war protests have more to do with the internal dynamics of French society than with a toning down of anti-war sentiment.

France is home to over five million Muslims, most of them north African Arabs. Islam is France's second most-practiced religion. The majority of these Muslims came to France as immigrant workers during the post-World War II industrial boom. Their children, French citizens all, make up a large, aggressive and vocal underclass that is now claiming its place in the sun. Arab youths feel they have become the victims of institutionalised racism and see the Jewish community as both more affluent and better integrated.

Caught between two cultures, often rejected by the French mainstream, these youngsters have given vent to their frustration and anger through support for the second intifada in the occupied Palestinian territories. There has been a dramatic rise in acts of anti-Semitism, including attacks on Jewish synagogues, schools and cemeteries. Police say the anti-Semite, anti-immigrant National Front, the traditional perpetrator of such racist violence, has now been supplanted by disaffected Arab youth from semi-urban ghettoes located on the periphery of major French towns and cities.

France's 5 million Muslims and 650,000 Jews, both the biggest communities of their kind in Europe, have been put under severe strain in the past two years by the surge in Middle East violence since the second Palestinian uprising began.

Scores of anti-Jewish attacks were recorded last year, including several fire bombings of synagogues and insults and assaults on Jews. In schools, most of the 455 racist and anti-Jewish incidents reported in the first term this year involved insults, offensive graffiti and vandalism. Physical violence is rare.

France has begun an effort to stamp out anti-semitism and racism in its schools, fearing that the war in Iraq could seriously heighten the tension between its Muslim and Jewish communities. The Education Minister, Luc Ferry, said regional cells would be set up to monitor and respond to anti-semitic and racist acts by schoolchildren and help schools address the problem, adding that teachers would no longer be allowed to turn a blind eye to the harassment of Jewish pupils.

Members of the Government and most Jewish leaders have consistently said that the rising inter-community tension and sporadic violence are mainly the consequence of political rather than religious differences. Demonstrations against the U.S.-led coalition on Iraq have also become protests against Ariel Sharon and Israel's repressive policies in the Palestinian lands. But some foreign Jewish groups, particularly in America and Israel, have seen in the incidents evidence of an acceptance of anti-semitism and an echo of the dark days of the Vichy collaborationist wartime Government, which oversaw the deportation of 75,000 French Jews to Nazi death camps.

Jewish students, usually Left voting and politically aware, have begun to stay away from the anti-war demonstrations after four left-wing Jewish students were attacked with iron bars by a group of Arab youths. The country's Muslim population makes a direct link between Mr. Bush and the Israeli Prime Minister, Ariel Sharon, saying the war in Iraq will lead to a settlement of the Palestinian question in favour of Israel. Many fear Mr. Bush will encourage Mr. Sharon to push ahead with repressive policies in order to further weaken the Palestinian authority and Islamic resistance groups such as Hamas, in order to reoccupy, perhaps even annex the occupied territories.

However, the demonstrations apart, there have been few concrete signs so far that the war against Iraq is leading to unrest in France's Muslim and Arab populations, and the evidence suggests that serious racist incidents are declining since tough new discrimination laws were pushed by the Interior Minister, Nicolas Sarkozy.

The Jewish community is worried about being made a scapegoat while Muslims fear being singled out as the enemy. Mr. Chirac is leading the international opposition to the U.S.-led attack on Baghdad, and many observers have pointed out that his stance is influenced at least in part by the fear of a potential Arab backlash at home if France in any way softens its policy.

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