Today's Date:

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TERRORISM

Q. – Perhaps the last question, but a very important one, concerning the battle against terrorism and the problems, not of Islam as such but of Islamism, extremist trends of that religion, which present a problem for Europe in general, for France and Russia. What is France’s view of this problem?

THE MINISTER – If we’re talking about the battle against terrorism, we’re all affected – and international terrorism has struck my country several times –, we all remember the dreadful images of horror and destruction in Madrid, Moscow and Beslan. And so we’re playing our part in the global battle against terrorism and against all sources of the financing of terrorism. We stand shoulder to shoulder with all victims of terrorism. This is also what justifies this aspect of the regular dialogue between Russia and France on all security issues.

Of course, when you talk about terrorism and the battle it justifies, conducted by the police services who have to cooperate, the courts, the intelligence agencies, in accordance with the rule of law, you have to talk too about the reasons, roots of the terrorism. We think, as I said at the United Nations last September, that a safer, freer world must also be a fairer world. And so we want to combat the political tensions and regional conflicts, the injustices which fuel the violence and are a sort of resonance chamber for the terrorists, sometimes giving them a recruitment base.

FRANCE/ISLAM/LAICITÉ

In my view, this is a different issue from, for example, French policy vis-à-vis Islam. In our country, we have a special situation and a special philosophy regarding respect for all religions, it's a republican philosophy, if I can put it like that. French citizenship does not rest on membership of a cultural, ethnic or religious group. We have a very important law which we are very committed to, the one on secularity (laïcité). It's a law which protects religious freedom, while ensuring the separation between the State and the different faiths, by safeguarding the equality of all the citizens, regardless of their [political] sensibilities, beliefs or faith.

Islam is today France's second religion and so it's an important dimension of French society. We have in fact institutions, a French Council of the Muslim Faith, to talk to all Muslim French and the Muslims who live in France.

RUSSIA

THE MINISTER – I need to go on discovering this country which I have visited a few times, but I haven't been everywhere. So I'm approaching this with a great deal of enthusiasm and at the same time a great deal of humility. Russia is a vast country, a continent-wide State extending from Europe to Asia, which has substantial natural resources, which has, as we're seeing at the moment, an economic development potential, which has a geopolitical role and must be the European Union's partner on our continent.

So I am genuinely enthusiastic about discovering this country, getting to know it better and of course, first of all, getting better acquainted with the men and women who live in Russia. And it is also one of France and President Chirac's foreign policy priorities to have a very substantive relationship with Russia, traditionally founded on a common history, a history shared by our two peoples, but also geared to the global challenges of the future./.