Jean-Noël during an interview on the BBC this Sunday, November 24. JEFF OVERS / AFP
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It's a little sentence that clarifies a vagueness maintained by the right in government in recent days. Asked this Sunday, November 24, about the international arrest warrant issued Thursday by the International Criminal Court (ICC) against Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and whether the latter would be arrested on French soil, the French Minister of Foreign Affairs Jean-Noël Barrot, affirmed, on the set of France 3, that “France will always apply international law”.
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No question, therefore, as demanded by the LR deputy Philippe Juvin or his colleague from the National Rally Philippe Ballard, of ignoring the arrest warrant from the ICC, an international institution which shines for its « primary anti-Israelism »according to the first. “There is clearly a desire to humiliate Israel through this decision”had even regretted the vice-president of the National Rally Sébastien Chenu on Franceinfo on Friday. “Anything that hinders a political solution is not necessarily welcome at the moment”added the Macronist deputy Sylvain Maillard on the same antenna.
A “hypothetical question”?
On the government side, vagueness was required until now… The spokesperson for French diplomacy, Christophe Lemoine, limited himself, on Friday, to “take note” of the ICC decision and to recall “the long-standing commitment [de la France] in support of international justice » et “his attachment to the independent work of the Court”.
The clarification is therefore made. And it will probably reassure former Minister of Foreign Affairs (and Prime Minister) Dominique de Villepin, for whom France risked losing credibility, particularly on the Ukrainian issue, if it refused to respect a mandate from the court. “ France has already responded. She will apply — and she had already announced this through the mouth of Mr. Séjourné — of course the court decision by the International Criminal Court », he hoped on Thursday, on LCI.
Jean-Noël Barrot, however, clarified that the arrest of Benyamin Netanyahu in France remains “a hypothetical question that I don’t have to answer as long as it’s hypothetical”. And the head of French diplomacy emphasized that this mandate was only the “formalization of an accusation” and not a judgment.
