French
leaders look back at ten years since 9-11. Left to right:
French
National Assembly President Bernard Accoyer, Interior
Minister
Claude Guéant, Justice Minister Michel Mercier, Prime
Minister
François Fillon and Foreign Minister Alain Juppe.
Paris Match, France
French Leaders Recall
September 11 Attacks
"The
democracies have become aware of their fragility. It was also the beginning of
a still uncompleted war between the terrorist networks and our societies, which
are often unconscious of how fortunate we are."
-- Chairman of the Union
for French Democracy Francois Bayrou
Paris: The first plane
strikes the North tower of the World Trade Center. In France, Prime Minister Lionel Jospin’s secretary,
already aware, interrupts his meeting and turns on the television. Everyone
else in the country does the same. A little over seven months later, Jean-Marie Le Pen
reaches the second round of the presidential election. Over the past ten years,
France has changed. And again, France is on the eve of a presidential election.
It is a time for memories and
taking stock. There are those who were in command [on Sept. 11]. Many of them
will attend the VIIth
International Congress of Victims of Terrorism, which will be held in Paris
for the first time from September 15-17. “We’ve separated it from September 11th so
as not to mix a time for reflection with one of emotion,” asserts Guillaume
Denoix de Saint Marc, managing director of the French Association of Victims
of Terrorism. Lionel Jospin, Elisabeth Guigou, along
with former Spain Prime Minister Jose Maria Aznar, will
be there. The event will also be attended by those who are at the helm today: President
Nicolas Sarkozy and
ministers Claude
Guéant [Interior], Michel
Mercier [Justice] and Alain Juppé [Foreign Ministry]. On a trip
to New York a few days later - on September 22nd - for the 125th anniversary of
the Statue of Liberty, President Sarkozy is expected to make a "significant" speech.
Posted by WORLDMEETS.US
So what do today’s leaders take
away from September 11?For [UDF Party
Chair] Francois Bayrou,
this date proved to be a turning point:“The
democracies have become aware of their fragility.It was also the beginning of a still uncompleted war
between the terrorist networks and our societies, which are often unconscious
of how fortunate we are.”
[Socialist Party Secretary] Pierre Moscovici, who
will take part on Sunday, September 11, in a ceremony for the elders of Liberty
[retired soldiers who fought for France during WWII] drew a parallel "between
different types of oppression - between Nazism and fanaticism.” On September 11, 2001, when he was minister of European
affairs, Moscovici saw “a great cloud” of smoke out of the window of the plane carrying
him to Boston.
For [Magistrate] Eva Joly, “History changed
dramatically that day, when the terrorist attack created security-related
stress among Western populations.”The Green
candidate [for president] will make defense one of her campaign issues.She considers that, “this attack also led to a new
conception of defense based on preventive war.”
She emphasizes how the Iraq
War created a gap, “between the Arab-Muslim world and the West, which resulted
in a rising fear vis-a-vis Islam.”She
added:“I also recall another September
11th - the coup d’etat in Chile, which was another violent attack on democracy.” [Left Party Senator] Jean-Luc Mélenchon
shares the same point of reference: On September
11th, he will lay a wreath in memory of Chilean President Salvador Allende, who
died 38 years ago to the day.
