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PARIS — France’s President Nicolas Sarkozy hosts British Prime Minister David Cameron on Feb. 18 for a summit on boosting defense cooperation and to clear the air after recent bitter clashes over Europe.
Sarkozy, who was to launch his re-election campaign on Feb. 16, will be keen to highlight his foreign policy successes including an unprecedented defense pact with Britain and the two countries’ successful military campaign in Libya.
Sources in the French presidency said the defense pact will be central to the Feb. 18 talks and that a number of “concrete steps forward” in military cooperation will be announced.
The agreement, signed in November 2010, included the creation of a joint military force, the sharing of aircraft carriers and closer nuclear research.
The talks will look to build on the two countries’ military cooperation on Libya, which saw French and British warplanes participate in the international air campaign that helped topple former strongman Moammar Gadhafi.
The two leaders will also be hoping to put recent spats over Europe behind them after several months of cross-Channel sniping.
Cameron’s rejection of a new European Union fiscal pact in December raised tensions, as did his ridiculing of Franco-German plans for a tax on financial transactions.
Sources, however, said these issues would not be brought up during the talks.
Another touchy subject unlikely to be raised is the recent win by France’s Rafale fighter jet program of the right to be the sole bidder for a major contract to supply warplanes to India.
Despite Britain’s strong ties with India, France’s Dassault beat out the U.K.-backed Eurofighter Typhoon for the contract and Cameron has pledged to press New Delhi to reverse its decision on the warplanes.
Hot-button international topics such as Syria and Iran are also sure to come up. British media have reported that Sarkozy and Cameron will discuss a possible increase in help to Syrian rebels, including giving them military advice.
Franco-British civilian nuclear cooperation will also be on the table.
Unlike Germany and Italy, which decided to abandon nuclear power after the Fukushima disaster in Japan, Cameron’s government is pushing ahead with plans to upgrade its atomic energy facilities.
French energy giant EDF, which owns eight British power stations, is hoping to win a contract worth an estimated 35 billion euros ($46 billion) for the upgrades.
