Today's Date:

THE PRESIDENT – (...) Prague will go down as a historic summit because it's the enlargement summit (...) being held, moreover, concurrently – in a few days' time – with the one in Copenhagen, when the European Union is also going to carry out its own enlargement. But for NATO, the Prague Summit has also been the one which has approved the adaptation of its force and command structures, set up a more resolutely future-orientated Alliance, and taken on board the problems of our time particularly since 11 September.

So it was a summit which dealt with some relatively important issues. First of all as regards the enlargement, we welcomed seven new members. These twin decisions of Prague and Copenhagen – in a few days' time – mark a milestone in the history of a Europe which, having become aware of its unity of interests, has set in train the process of pushing its borders to their limits. This summit has taken an important step in this direction, another will be taken in Copenhagen in the same spirit of rejecting all fault lines within Europe (...).

The decisions [of this summit] also launch an ambitious process of adapting and reforming the Alliance to meet the new challenges I was talking about just now. The decisions on streamlining the command structures and reforming the force structures draw essentially on the principles we have always maintained, i.e. flexibility, reactivity, interoperability and efficiency. These measures are, I note, perfectly consistent (...) with the reforms France has been carrying out on the military front since 1995, and also perfectly consistent with Europe's defence commitments (...).

The proposed NATO rapid response force will allow us, I believe, to meet in a more satisfactory way the requirements for crisis management, which up to now has been conducted on an ad hoc basis.

We shall naturally be mindful of the need for this Force, which relies on national capabilities, to develop in a way which is consistent with the European Union's defence efforts. And, quite obviously, at national level, we shall ensure that the status of our own forces is respected. Finally, we shall ensure that the nations have political control over this instrument. This is the condition for our participation.

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In the discussions on the Alliance's new missions, we collectively raised the problem of the fight against terrorism. (...) The fight against terrorism must be intensified (...). But we obviously have to be aware of the need to attack the evil at its root, and to attack poverty and the regional crises which engender humiliation and hatred.

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As regards the battle against the proliferation of weapons of mass destruction, France of course subscribed to the decisions taken at this summit. And I highlighted the need for an approach combining both the political and military instruments, since the multilateral nuclear, biological and chemical non-proliferation regimes are more essential than ever before.

Then we discussed the relations between the European Union and NATO. This discussion, I took the liberty of recalling, should now be successfully concluded, in the interest of both the European Union and NATO. (...) The special position of Turkey had held things up. We now seem to be on the way to a positive way forward which will allow the European Union to take over from the NATO peacekeeping force in Macedonia in February.

We obviously talked about the international problems. As regards Iraq, the summit was unanimous. (...) The summit declaration on this subject expressed our total and unreserved acceptance of and support for UNSCR 1441, while saying how important it was today for the Iraqi authorities to understand that this unanimity signalled a real determination on the part of the international community to see genuine disarmament, to make really sure that Iraq no longer possesses any weapons of mass destruction.

We also talked about Afghanistan, of course, with a mixture of both hope and fear. ISAF's [International Security Assistance Force] presence in Kabul remains necessary and so we approved and thanked our German and Dutch friends who are going to take over from Turkey. (...) I said that, as far as she was concerned, France would maintain her contribution of 450 men.

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