The Taliban have tried to kill Zainullah, a former translator for the French Army, twice already
By
A Malian arrested after a French police officer was shot at in Bamako "hates white people", sources close to the investigation told AFP on Saturday.
At least four French soldiers were killed and several wounded in a suicide attack against a convoy of Nato-led troops in eastern Afghanistan.
Pirates off the coast of Somalia released 30 hostages seized aboard a French yacht a week ago following negotiations that ended the stand-off peacefully, French officials said. The hostages, including 22 French crew aboard Le Ponant, were freed ”without incident”, President Nicolas Sarkozy said in a statement, without providing details.
Somali officials on Monday urged tough action against pirates holding a French yacht after an elite French army unit was placed on standby to intervene if negotiations failed. The local governor in Somalia’s breakaway northern region of Puntland, Musa Ghelle Yusuf, said he would be "happy … to see the pirates killed".
No image available
/ 29 February 2008
France will renegotiate all its defence accords with African countries, President Nicolas Sarkozy said on Thursday in a move that could scale back France’s military support for some of its closest allies. France has defence cooperation agreements with several former colonies under which its forces provide varying degrees of military assistance.
No image available
/ 15 February 2008
A state of emergency declared in Chad will do little to calm nerves among residents in the capital, Ndjamena, many of whom complain soldiers are already taking advantage of a security crackdown to loot homes. President Idriss Déby Itno declared a state of emergency across the former French colony late on Thursday.
No image available
/ 4 February 2008
Resolutions at the United Nations or African Union could alter the mission of French troops in Chad, France’s Foreign Minister said on Monday as a first planeload of evacuees landed at a Paris airport. Foreign Minister Bernard Kouchner and Defence Minister Herve Morin said French forces secured Chad’s airbases and were protecting French and foreign civilians.
No image available
/ 3 February 2008
Fierce fighting with tanks and helicopter strikes rocked the capital of Chad for a second day on Sunday as rebels surrounded President Idriss Déby Itno in his palace and hundreds of foreigners fled the country. International aid organisations reported bodies in the streets and hundreds of people wounded.
No image available
/ 30 November 2007
Chadian anti-government rebels on Friday declared a ”state of war” against French and foreign military forces in an apparent warning to a European Union peacekeeping force that plans to deploy there soon. French troops and aircraft are stationed in Chad under a bilateral defence accord.
No image available
/ 29 October 2007
Paris scrambled on Monday to contain a row sparked by a French charity’s bid to airlift more than 100 children out of Chad, a key ally for Europe’s peacekeeping strategy in Sudan’s war-ravaged Darfur region. Chad President Idriss Déby Itno reacted furiously to the botched operation, even suggesting the charity planned to sell the children to paedophiles.
No image available
/ 27 September 2007
Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC) hopes a new biometric identity card (ID) scheme backed by the European Union can help overhaul its undisciplined armed forces, branded by campaigners as the central African state’s worst rights abuser. After decades as a tool of repression under former leader Mobutu Sese Seko and a devastating 1998 to 2003 war, DRC’s army is bloated, unmanageable and corrupt.
No image available
/ 23 September 2007
The world’s best-known mime artist, Marcel Marceau, has died aged 84, French Prime Minister Francois Fillon’s office said on September 23. For decades, Marceau epitomised his silent art, eliciting laughter and tears from audiences around the globe. His comic and tragic sketches appeal on a universal level.
No image available
/ 23 September 2007
The world’s best-known mime artist, Marcel Marceau, has died aged 84, French Prime Minister Francois Fillon’s office said on Sunday. For decades, Marceau epitomised his silent art, eliciting laughter and tears from audiences around the globe. His comic and tragic sketches appeal on a universal level.