French leader: We must act on Iran to avoid "disaster" of IAF strike.
By JPOST.COM STAFFSarkozy Obama nuke Summit 311(photo credit: Associated Press)
If the world doesn’t act to prevent Iran from attaining nuclear arms,it could be responsible for a war between Israel and the IslamicRepublic, French President Nicolas Sarkozy warned on Monday night, asthe Nuclear Security Summit opened in Washington.“I would notwant the world to wake up to a conflict between Israel and Iran quitesimply because the international community has been incapable ofacting,” the French president told CBS News.An IAF strike on Iran’s nuclear facilities would be disastrous, he warned.“Itwould be a disaster. I don’t even want to think about thatpossibility,” Sarkozy said. “And the best way to avoid this disasterscenario is to take measures in order to get Israel to understand thatwe are determined to ensure its security. And Israel, furthermore, mustequally make the necessary effort in order to bring about a fair andlasting peace with their Palestinian neighbors.”Sarkozyreiterated that a nuclear-armed Iran would be “dangerous andunacceptable,” particularly in light of “the many statements made byIranian leaders against the democracy that is Israel.”Patiencewith Iran had it limits, and so the time had come to vote for sanctionsagainst the leaders “who are leading the country to the wall,” he said.Whilea unified UN Security Council decision would be best, it must not comeat the cost of a resolution so toothless that it would achieve nothing,Sarkozy added.The French president said his own country couldnot give up its nuclear weapons, since doing so would jeopardize thenation’s security. He stressed that France was the only country in theworld that had actually declared how many nuclear warheads it possessed– which, he emphasized, had been dropped to 300 – and that it hadstopped all nuclear testing. However, he said, France can do no morethan that at present.“I feel that if I were to go any further, I could in fact jeopardizethe security of my country, and as head of state, I am the guarantorand guarantee of that security,” he said.Sarkozy went on to say that while everyone would applaud a “virtualworld” with no nuclear weapons, such a reality was currently no morethan “an awesome dream.”
“I have inherited the legacy of the efforts made by my predecessors tobuild up arms as a nuclear power, and I could not give up nuclearweapons, insofar as I wasn’t sure that the world was a stable and safeplace,” he said. “I will not give up that nuclear weapon because itunderpins my country’s security. I will not do so on a unilateral basisin a world as dangerous as the one in which we live in today.”
