Posted on 05/14/2007 3:49:28 PM PDT by Cincinna
PARIS, May 14, 2007 (AFP) - Bernard Kouchner, a world-renowned humanitarian who founded the Doctors without Borders (MSF) charity and served as the UN's representative in Kosovo, is likely to be France's next foreign minister, aides to president-elect Nicolas Sarkozy said Monday.
The 67-year-old doctor and opposition Socialist Party politician was approached by Sarkozy over the last few days and "is ready to enter the government," they said.
According to Le Monde newspaper, he was to see Sarkozy on Monday afternoon for talks centring on a future minister's range of responsibilities.
Sarkozy, 52, a right-winger who advocates radical economic reforms, beat the Socialist Segolene Royal in elections on May 6 and takes over from Jacques Chirac on Wednesday. He is expected to announce his full government on Friday.
Kouchner founded the international medical charity MSF in 1971 after working as a doctor in Biafra. Following a rift with other founder members, he set up a second organisation -- Doctors of the World (MDM) -- in 1980.
He was in successive Socialist governments from 1988, most recently serving as health minister under prime minister Lionel Jospin.
From 1999 to 2001 he was the UN's High Representative in Kosovo, where he oversaw the creation of civilian and political institutions following the NATO bombing campaign to drive out Serb forces.
Kouchner is famous for developing the theory of "humanitarian intervention" to justify international action against dictators who flout human rights.
In the run-up to the American-led invasion of Iraq in 2003, he favoured the overthrow of Saddam Hussein and strongly criticised French policy which he said left the US and Britain with little choice but to go to war without UN backing.
In March 2003 Chirac said France would veto a UN security council resolution authorising military action against Saddam Hussein -- a position which was used by Washington and London as justification for going it alone.
"If we had been at their side we could have avoided the war. I regret the failure of diplomacy, including our own. We should have gone along with (the Americans). That was all they asked for," he said shortly after the invasion.
In a January 2004 interview Kouchner lamented that the French had become "America-haters."
"We have turned (George W.) Bush into the big enemy as if that alone was a policy.... The French are America-haters, and they are also back being racists and anti-Semites. The French are sick in the head," he said.
Regularly cited in polls as France's most popular politician, Kouchner has kept his distance from the Socialist Party hierarchy -- though he publicly supported Royal during the presidential campaign.
After her defeat he said that the left needed to "change its software" and "develop a common project ... with the centre."
Sarkozy has approached other Socialist politicians about possible ministerial posts, including former ministers Claude Allegre and Hubert Vedrine, in a bid to extend the political base of his government.
"What Kouchner can bring is that most precious political commodity ... a fragment of idealism," France's top political commentator Alain Duhamel wrote in a 2005 profile of the politician.
Kouchner was born in 1939 in the southern town of Avignon to a Jewish father and a Protestant mother. He trained as a gastro-enterologist in Paris, where he took part in the student protests of May 1968. His second wife is the television presenter Christine Ockrent.
Surely, you do not refer to the Kosovo Liberation Army, the maoist Albanians, the jihadist Albanian/Kosovo/Muslim penetrator/immigrant invadors?
yitbos
I think we need to see a picture of the second wife before we can comprehensively evaluate this potential appointment.
While saving people around the globe, Dr. Kouchner performing euthanasia on patients whose religious conviction does not allow it.This is against the law, this is against medical ethics. This is first degree homicide. Kouchener is unconvicted murderer. And he brags about it.
-During his tenure in Kosovo, over 1000 Albanians were murdered by Albanian terrorists. He did nothing to protect them. The entire families were massacred by terrorists and dumped to the landfill.
-the largest ethic cleansing of the Balkan civil wars took place during Kouchner's tenure: 300 000 Serbs, Roma, Jews, Goranis, Croats were expelled from Kosovo mismanaged by Kouchner.
-over 100 Christian churches and ancient monasteries were burned down or dynamited. Kouchner did nothing.
Koucher publicly supported Albanian terrorists and called them "HIS FAVORITE PEOPLE".
Doctors of Serb ethicity were murdered by Albanian terrorists and Dr. Kouchner did nothing to protect them or find them when abducted. He sided with terrorists.
Kouchner is the scum of the worst kind, comparable to Dr. Mengele. Perhaps he can make a good politician, but as a human being and a Doctor, he is merde.
France is presently moving to the political right while, at the same time, the U.S. is moving to the political left. I certainly hope that the Republicans are able to successfully turn it around within the entire U.S. before November 4, 2008, but I have my doubts about this.
I guess that’s a good thing. Is he something akin to their Zell Miller, perhaps?
Perhaps. I’m surprised they’re willing to try.
Over 30? As in “Don’t trust anyone over 30”? If a socialist gets the war on islamonazis, I’m willing to make common cause until they are defeated. I’ll fight over economic systems later.
Sarkozy, 52, a right-winger who advocates radical economic reforms
I don’t like him. He’s for the euthanasia. He’s still a socialist. Although they are not the worst, I don’t understand why Sarkozy wants to include Socialists in his government. I believed that the the right win the election...
I’m very pessimistic for change now.
Bernard Kouchner is Clintonian Islamofascist loving bastard!
Bernard Kouchner’s Legacy of FailureWe have long been complaining about the U.S. news media and its failure to inform the public about the Clinton Administration’s “legacy” of anarchy and mayhem in Kosovo. The news media in the U.S. has been almost completely silent about the ongoing genocide against Serbs, who are being victimized by terrorists associated with the “disbanded” KLA and its sympathizers in the U.N./KFOR occupation.
Over the past few months, though, the level of bloodshed has increased enough that news of it is beginning to trickle through the blockade in the mainstream U.S. news media.
In a Newsweek interview on May 15, 2000, Bernard Kouchner, the U.N. official in charge of the occupation of Kosovo, even admitted, “Apparently a Serb has a 20 times greater chance of being a victim of a crime than an Albanian does.” (See http://www.listbot.com/cgi-bin/subscriber?Act=view_message&list_id=STOPNATO&; msg_num=9003&start_num=9008.) But the tone of the Newsweek interview made it clear that neither Kouchner nor the magazine’s interviewer were unduly concerned about this fact.
http://www.serb.org/serbia/bernard-kouchners-legacy-failure.php
Read the above article and comments from Kouchner about his feelings about Iraq and Israel. He is pro-American, pro-Israel, and anti-Islamo-fascist.
Very smart move, indeed. Considering that Kouchner is one of the most admired and respected people in France.
His statements of support for the US position , and his early support for taking out Saddam, along with his other very pro-American statements , make this a very good move.
It also takes away from the PS one of their most popular leaders.
I know that, but there were others than him for being foreign minister. Why choose a socialist ? That’s just a tactic policies for win the legislatives by reduce the new center-side opposition (Bayrou who wants to make a governement with right and left minister). It’s very clear that Sarkozy is a professionnel and much more a strong opportunist. I don’t like that.
I remember that Doctors without borders attacked the media after the Iraq invasion saying they were hysterically exaggerating the humanitarian situation in Iraq.
Cheers.
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