France has called back its ambassadors from the United States and Australia for consultations, as a protest against the US-UK-Australia defence alliance, which has led to cancellation of French submarine deal with Australia.
Australia today cancelled a multibillion-dollar deal for conventional French submarines to enter a strategic Indo-Pacific alliance with the United States and Britain in which it will obtain US nuclear-powered submarines.
Calling the cancellation “unacceptable behaviour”, Foreign Minister Jean-Yves Le Drian said in a statement on Friday the decision to recall the envoys, on request from President Emmanuel Macron, “is justified by the exceptional seriousness of the announcements” made by Australia and the United States.
A White House official said that the US regrets France’s decision and will continue to be engaged in the coming days to resolve differences between the two countries.
Australia said on Saturday it also regrets France’s decision, adding that it values its relationship with France and will keep engaging with Paris on many other issues.
“We note with regret France’s decision to recall its Ambassador to Australia,” a spokesperson for the foreign ministry said in a statement.
“Australia values its relationship with France … We look forward to engaging with France again on our many issues of shared interest, based on shared values.”
The recalls from the United States and Australia, key allies of France, are unprecedented.
Earlier on Friday, a top French diplomat spoke of a “crisis” in relations with the US.
The diplomat, who spoke to The Associated Press news agency anonymously in line with customary government practice, said that for Paris “this is a strategic question concerning the very nature of the relationship between Europe and the United States about the Indo-Pacific strategy”.https://b3eaaa9d92e6d6f2b2b09b073e01bd20.safeframe.googlesyndication.com/safeframe/1-0-38/html/container.html
He would not speculate on the effects the situation would have on France’s relationship with the US.
