While a European council will put on the table at the beginning of December the question of possible sanctions against Turkey, Paris awaits
"acts"
on the part of Recep Tayyip Erdogan.
"It is not enough that, for two or three days, one notes soothing statements on behalf of the president",
affirmed Jean-Yves Le Drian in the program "Le Grand Jury RTL-Le Figaro-LCI", Sunday.
The Foreign Minister reiterated France's opposition to
Turkey's
“fait accompli”
and denounced its
“expansionist will”.
Between Paris and Ankara, the disagreements concern many issues: Iraq, Libya and Syria, the eastern Mediterranean where the Turks
"attack"
two EU member countries, Greece and Cyprus, Nagorno-Karabakh, where they send Syrian mercenaries.
“We have to deal with these disagreements, but that would require the will of Turkey.
But Erdogan's slanderous remarks (against Emmanuel Macron) do not lend themselves to dialogue, ”
explains Jean-Yves Le Drian.
Already very bad, Franco-Turkish relations deteriorated further when Erdogan led a sling against France in the Muslim world following the new case of the Muhammad cartoons, and he launched a movement of boycotting French products.
Transmitted by Paris to Europe, the Turkish question must be assessed in the coming days.
But while the Turkish president on Saturday called on the European Union for dialogue, campaigning in front of his party the AKP for
"stronger cooperation with our European friends and allies"
, the French foreign minister affirms that Turkey
"will be judged on his actions ”
and not on his words.
He expects gestures from Ankara.
“
There are some that are easy to do in the Eastern Mediterranean, in Libya.
There are also some that are easy to do in Nagorno-Karabakh.
"
One of the rare subjects of consensus
Since his interview with
The Economist
a year ago in which he spoke
of NATO's
“brain death”
, shaking his partners, Emmanuel Macron has opposed all of Erdogan's provocations.
It is trying to rally its partners within the EU but also within the Atlantic Alliance to its policy.
The Turkish subject was thus broached by the head of French diplomacy during the visit, last week, of the American Secretary of State, Mike Pompeo.
According to Paris, it was even one of the rare subjects of consensus between Donald Trump's minister and French leaders.
To the "Grand Jury" of RTL, Jean-Yves Le Drian, in a rare commentary on American policy since the elections, denounced, like Joe Biden,
"the incredible irresponsibility"
of Donald Trump, who refuses to 'accept defeat and whose team is putting pressure on the process of appointing the voters.
"I see that Joe Biden's statement matches reality,"
he said.
Rejecting the term institutional
"coup"
, he said he believed in the
"solidity of democracy",
which he is sure
"will be there".