The day after, barely a few hours, of the brutal cancellation by Australia of the purchase of twelve French submarines, Jean-Yves Le Drian stepped up to the plate. The Minister of Foreign Affairs estimates this Thursday morning that "it is really a blow in the back. We had established a relationship of trust with Australia and this trust is being betrayed ”. “I am very angry today. It is not done between allies, ”denounced the head of French diplomacy on France Info. And recall that the negotiations began in 2014 and ended in 2016 with a contract, "established after a geostrategic analysis of the situation in Australia", which therefore took into account the proximity of China geography.
Wednesday evening at 11 p.m. French time, Australian Prime Minister Scott Morrison announced, by videoconference via the White House, that his country was giving up deliveries of Naval group buildings to "take another path" responding to a "change in need. ". Australia will acquire American nuclear-powered devices as part of a strategic partnership with the United States and Great Britain in the Indo-Pacific zone. Jean-Yves Le Drian also wondered about “American behavior”. "This unilateral, brutal, unpredictable decision looks a lot like what Mr. Trump was doing," he criticized.
Sweeping aside the very diplomatic remarks of Joe Biden - the American president assured that he wanted to "work closely with France" in this strategic area, Paris remaining "a key partner" of the United States - the French minister castigates this Thursday morning "a lack of clarity evident in the words of Mr. Biden and Mr. Morrison ”.
"This is a major breach of trust, I am really very angry," he said, recalling that Australians were currently working in Cherbourg while Naval group employees were in Adelaide.
And to warn: "it is not over, we will need clarifications, we have contracts, the Australians will have to tell us how they are coming out".
