France to Save its Client State, Iran

France’s ex-intelligence chief to travel to Iran on mission - report


Paris, Jan. 19 - The French daily Le Figaro reported on Thursday that France’s former intelligence chief will travel to Iran next week on a mission to convince the Islamic Republic to play a cooperative role to resolve the political deadlock in Lebanon.Jean-Claude Cousseran, who headed France's foreign intelligence agency (DGSE) from 2000 to 2002 and is a former ambassador to Egypt will be travelling to Tehran on the orders of French President Jacques Chirac as part of a new diplomatic overture to Iran.The report, which quoted “diplomatic sources”, said that Cousseran is very familiar with Middle Eastern politics.

Amir Taheri has a fascinating piece on Chriac's motivation behind such a desperate move. Here are a few lines:

Chirac wants to try his luck with the Khomeinist regime in Tehran in the hope of persuading it to reduce its nuclear ambitions, abandon Hezballah, and join France in creating a new "axis of independence". That is to say an anti-American bloc, in the Middle East.

Chirac's hopes to achieve "something dramatic" before next month, when he is to host an international conference on Lebanon in Paris.

Still harbour illusions about securing a third term as president, Chirac may be banking on a sensational diplomatic coup to help launch his bid in the teeth of opposition from his own neo-Gaullist party. His last few remaining friends are already trying to portray him as "the wise old man" of international politics, one who opposed "George W Bush's folly" of invading Iraq.
As Chirac sees things, over the next few weeks his diplomatic coup may achieve several objectives before the end of March when he has promised to tell everyone whether he wishes to seek re-election.

Here is how things are supposed to work out, according to Chirac's imagination: a senior French emissary, a former head of the country's secret services, goes to Tehran and obtains a one-on-one-with the "Supreme Guide" Ali Khamenehi. The emissary, Jean-Calude Cousseran, tells the top mullah that the "Anglo-Saxons", that is to say the US and Britain, are preparing to take military action against the Islamic Republic. He will intimate some supposedly secret information on the subject, and will point to the US naval build up in the region as a sure sign that something is afoot.

Amir Taheri was born in Iran and educated in Tehran, London and Paris. Between 1980 and 1984 he was Middle East editor for the London Sunday Times. Taheri has been a contributor to the International Herald Tribune since 1980. He has also written for The Wall Street Journal, The New York Times, and The Washington Post. Taheri has published nine books some of which have been translated into 20 languages, and In 1988 Publishers'' Weekly in New York chose his study of Islamist terrorism, "Holy Terror", as one of The Best Books of The Year. He has been a columnist Asharq Alawsat since 1987.