French FM to visit Moscow September 6-7

PARIS, September 1 (Itar-Tass) — French Foreign Minister Alain Juppe will visit Moscow on September 6-7 to take part in a meeting of the Russian-French Security Cooperation Council.

“High on the agenda will be bilateral cooperation between France and Russia,” Juppe told Itar-Tass on the sidelines of the annual ambassadors conference in Paris on Thursday. “We will also discuss the situation in Libya and Syria.”

The Russian-French Security Cooperation Council will meet for the tenth time since its creation in 2002. The meeting takes place in the two-plus-two format involving the two countries’ ministers of foreign affairs and defence.

Russia will make clear to France its position on the situation in Libya already on Thursday within the framework of the international conference on Libya that is opening in Paris. The Russian delegation is led by the president’s special envoy to Africa, Mikhail Margelov.

“Participation in this new international format that entirely focuses on the peace settlement in Libya will allow to demonstrate Russia’s vision of the process of creating a new statehood in the country, to exert a certain influence on this process, in other words, to protect Russia’s economic and other interests,” Margelov told Itar-Tass ahead of the conference.

The conference on Libya will bring together representatives from 60 countries and international organizations, including the United Nations and the League of Arab States.

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