The Minister for Europe and Foreign Affairs, Mme Catherine Colonna, will go to Lebanon, Israel and the Palestinian Territories on 16 and 17 December. The Minister will update her interlocutors on France’s action based on the humanitarian, security and political pillars of President Macron’s Initiative for peace and security for all.
In Lebanon, the Minister’s visit builds on France’s efforts to avoid regional conflagration. The Minister will recall France’s commitment to Lebanon’s sovereignty and integrity and stress the urgent need to implement Resolution 1701 in full and find a way out of the institutional vacuum in Lebanon. Among others, the Minister will talk to Lebanon’s Prime Minister Najib Mikati and UNIFIL’s Head of Mission and Force Commander, Major General Aroldo Lázaro Sáenz.
In Israel, the Minister will reaffirm France’s solidarity with the Israeli people and our commitment to its security. She will have meetings with her counterpart Minister Eli Cohen and Minister of Strategic Affairs Ron Dermer. She will meet the families of the missing French people to assure them of France’s support and its all-out efforts to secure their release. She will call for another immediate and durable truce which must lead to a long-term ceasefire, to secure the release of all the hostages still being held by Hamas and provide Gaza’s population with the aid it urgently needs. She will also express France’s full commitment to the fight against sexual and sexist violence, and its utter condemnation of such violence, particularly that perpetrated on 7 October by the Hamas terrorists. The Minister will reiterate the need to avoid regional conflagration.
In the Palestinian Territories, the Minister will have a meeting with her counterpart, Minister Riyad al-Maliki, to reiterate France’s support for the Palestinian Authority and the Palestinian population in Gaza and the West Bank and its active efforts to address the humanitarian emergency in Gaza in the long term. She will speak to her interlocutors about Gaza’s future governance and the political prospects for a lasting solution to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. In the West Bank, she will meet people on the front line of attacks by extremist settlers, which are undermining the prospects for peace.
France reiterates its steadfast commitment to promoting a just and lasting peace as part of the two-State solution.
Originally published at https://www.diplomatie.gouv.fr/en/country-files/israel-palestinian-territories/news/2023/article/catherine-colonna-s-visit-to-lebanon-israel-and-the-palestinian-territories-16
