Word: mitterrand
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Tumultuous mobs surged around the red brick walls of the French embassy in Tehran, demanding "death" for President François Mitterrand. Diplomats and businessmen and their families tried to get out, but as the first contingent of 61 arrived at Tehran's Mehrabad International Airport at 5:30 a.m. one day last week, a gang of Iranian militants blocked their way. Revolutionary authorities offered assurances that the evacuees would be released this week. But Ayatullah Ali Meshkini, one of his country's leading mullahs, warned that the incident could result in the French embassy being "taken over...
...There are no French 'hostages.' " Ironically, no other industrialized country has tried as hard as France to stay on the good side of Iran's revolutionary regime. President Mitterrand was one of the few Western leaders to send congratulations to Iran after the July 24 election of Mohammed Ali Raja'i as the country's latest Islamic President. But France, the country that provided political asylum for four months to Ayatullah Ruhollah Khomeini and for years to some of his closest aides, two weeks ago gave haven to Raja'i's predecessor...
...Spanish government also hoped that President François Mitterrand's new Socialist government would track down and extradite ETA terrorists taking refuge on French soil. Previous French governments were reluctant to cooperate, fearing that some of the people requested by the Spanish might be political dissidents, not terrorists. Last week French officials continued to be wary. Gaston Defferre, the Interior Minister, has gone so far as to declare that the war against the ETA in Spain is "political." Despite continuing pressure from Madrid, the French have still not agreed to the extradition proposal...
...other two newcomers, Italy's Spadolini, who had been in office only three weeks, and Japan's Prime Minister Zenko Suzuki, deliberately chose to play modest roles. The erudite and usually garrulous Spadolini, like Mitterrand, was outspoken only in assailing high U.S. interest rates, which he claimed had seriously jeopardized Italy's anti-inflation drive. The reticent Suzuki skillfully avoided drawing attention to himself-and thus escaped sharp criticism of his nation's selective, restrictive import policies and its aggressive overseas selling. Canada's Deputy Prime Minister MacEachen explained the reluctance of the conferees...
Next to Reagan, the fledgling summiteer most under scrutiny by other participants was Mitterrand. He reinforced his reputation as an intellectual by carrying a volume of the Pléiade series of French classical literature to a meeting with Spadolini, who said that Mitterrand had expressed "passionate interest in quattrocento Florence." Conveying an air of lofty civility, Mitterrand came across as surprisingly moderate; he particularly impressed U.S. officials with his advocacy of a strong Western military response to the Soviet arms buildup. Mitterrand was critical of the U.S. on only one major economic point: the high American interest rates. Said...