Russian President Arrives in France for Iraq Talks

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Last updated at: (Beijing Time) Tuesday, February 11, 2003

Russian President Arrives in France for Iraq Talks

Russian President Vladimir Putin arrived in Paris Monday for a three-day state visit believed to be centered on the Iraqi issue.

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Russian President Vladimir Putin arrived in Paris Monday for a three-day state visit believed to be centered on the Iraqi issue.

Putin will meet with French President Jacques Chirac, Prime Minister Jean-Pierre Raffarin and business heavyweights in Paris.

He will travel to the southwestern city of Bordeaux to visit the military electronics group of Thales on Wednesday.

On Monday afternoon, he is to have talks with Chirac, followed by a state dinner at the Elysee presidential palace.

In a conversation on phone last week, Putin and Chirac agreed that Russia and France share a common approach to the Iraqi crisisthat a diplomatic solution had to be pursued.

Before arriving here, Putin announced Sunday in Berlin that "the positions of France, Germany and Russia correspond" after discussion of a French-German joint plan on the disarmament of Iraq with German Chancellor Gerhard Schroeder.

It could be interpreted as a sign of a "French-German-Russian triangle aimed at opposing the American superpower on the Iraqi issue," commented French leading newspaper Le Figaro in its Monday's edition.

"The fact that Putin has been the first foreign leader to be put into confidence of a mysterious French-German disarmament planprovides some arguments for supporters of such a logic," it said.

Berlin said it was working with France on a series of proposalson the disarmament of Iraq to be presented to the UN Security Council on Thursday.

The initiatives could include tripling of the number of inspectors, turning Iraq into a no-fly zone and perhaps sending UNpeacekeepers into Iraq, according to reports from Berlin.

But a French foreign spokesman on Sunday denied the existence of what Berlin press called a "secret plan," saying that it involves merely the proposals to toughen the regime of UN inspections, which had been officially made public by French Foreign Minister Dominique de Villepin on Feb. 5.

United States Secretary of State Colin Powell dismissed the French-German suggestions as "not answering to the problem." "Whatwe need are not more inspectors but more cooperation from Iraq," he said.

Earlier on Monday, France and Belgium used their veto at the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO) to block a U.S. demand for military support in case of war on Iraq.

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