France retracted from earlier position concerning a withdrawal of its troops from Afghanistan even after four of its soldiers died a day earlier.
France retracted from earlier position concerning a withdrawal of its troops from Afghanistan even after four of its soldiers died a day earlier.
French President Nicolas Sarkozy reacted furiously and warned on Friday that his country might accelerate the withdrawal of its soldiers. However, US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton voiced doubt that France would make such a move.
On Saturday, Defense Minister Gerard Longuet and Chief of Defense staff Admiral Edouard Guillaud flew into Afghanistan for emergency talks.
Four French occupation soldiers were shot dead and 16 were wounded by a member of the Afghan army in eastern Afghanistan on Friday.
"The entire point of this visit is to assess the position that we have to take," Longuet told reporters after arriving in Kabul to make recommendations to President Nicolas Sarkozy on the future of the deployment.
Longuet appeared to distance himself slightly from the prospect of an immediate withdrawal, saying: "The mission remains exactly the same, to bring about a stable force" and "to handover" to the Afghans. "We must reflect in order to support a mission that is a success."
Longuet refused to be drawn about the possibility of an early withdrawal, saying only: "I'll talk about that with the president, he's my only boss."
Longuet held talks with General Jean-Pierre Palasset, the French commander on the ground at their main base in eastern Afghanistan, and was then due to meet General Nazar, commander of the 3rd Afghan army brigade.
He said the men were ‘victims of the trust’ they had in Afghan soldiers they were training at the base where one of them opened fire. "They didn't have a chance. This was murder," said Longuet.
Sarkozy said in a speech to diplomats in Paris that “the French army is alongside its allies but we cannot accept that a single one of our soldiers be wounded or killed by our allies, it's unacceptable”. "The French army isn't in Afghanistan to be shot at by Afghan soldiers”.
"If the security conditions aren't clearly established, the question of an early withdrawal of the French army will be raised”, Sarkozy added.
Clinton voiced doubt that France would accelerate the pullout.
"I'm in great sympathy with what happened to the French soldiers. It was terrible and I can certainly appreciate the strong feelings that are being expressed”, Clinton said at a press conference.
"We are in close contact with our French colleagues and we have no reason to believe that France will do anything other than continue to be part of the very carefully considered transition process as we look at our exit as previously agreed upon in Lisbon," Clinton added.
