Jack's back from Saudi Arabia. Did you miss him? What, you didn't notice he had left? Funny, outside of the Shura (see below), the Saudis didn't much noticed he had arrived.

CHIRAC ENDS SAUDI ARABIA TRIP WITHOUT DEAL

RIYADH March 6, 2006 (AFP) - French President Jacques Chirac wrapped up a three-day visit to Saudi Arabia Monday without clinching a defense deal as oil giant Total eyed a contract to build a refinery in the oil-rich kingdom.

"Saudi Arabia is actively pursuing a detailed study of different solutions" proposed to Riyadh in terms of cooperation in defense and security, Chirac told a news conference. "All this is taking place in an excellent climate," he said.

At stake is the sale of French Rafale fighters and a border monitoring system to Saudi Arabia... The fourth-generation Rafale, a multi-role combat jet...has yet to find an export market.

Chirac, whose visit came some two months after it was announced that Saudi Arabia would buy Typhoon Eurofighter jets from Britain ["...a massive deal reportedly worth up to $US70 billion ($95.5 billion)"], said he was pleased by the contacts established between more than a dozen French businessmen and industrialists accompanying him and Saudi counterparts.

Jack's recent trips abroad have been back-paged trade missions tarted up as state visits. Alas, the marquee magic doesn't clinch many deals. The recent Indian visit, poorly timed and freighted with controversies, is a case in point. Nine signed Franco-Indian make-nice agreements and no payday. Worse yet, background reports for Mr. Bush's upcoming visit the following week buried Jack's day-to-day holiday diplomacy. Of course, Jack wasn't making news or doing much business and Mr. Bush was doing both.

But Jack is a trooper and is ready to visit any head of state that provides a complimentaqry box lunch and will sign an agreement about something. And Jack loves to fly.

CHIRAC FLIES INTO TURBULENCE OVER JET JAUNTS

PARIS October 9, 2005 (Times UK) - He is known for big grocery bills but Jacques Chirac’s extensive air travel is also stirring curiosity among investigators trying to breach the secrecy surrounding French presidential spending. It emerged last week that only 400 of the 673 hours that Chirac spent aboard his luxurious presidential jet in 2003 can be accounted for by official trips, raising suspicions that he took the aircraft on holiday or lent it to friends, a possible abuse of public funds.

Under the French system Chirac is not obliged to explain what he does with his £56m budget — £20m more than the Queen’s.

Chirac’s flying habits in particular are being held up as an example of waste. Not wanting to ruin a night’s sleep, he has often told pilots not to land before 7am, regardless of the detours this can entail. An hour of flying costs up to £4,000. Bernadette, his wife,...was reported to have cost French taxpayers some £50,000 in 2003 by insisting on using a private jet rather than a local airline on the last leg of an official journey to join her husband in the south Pacific.

One of Chirac’s first actions when he came to power in 1995 was to place an air force unit in charge of the presidential jet, meaning that its activities are classified as military secrets and shielded from the French audit office.

Jack made headlines of a sort in Saudi Arabia by being the the first foreign leader to deliver a plodding lackluster speech to the Shura (Majlis al-Shura), the Saudi Consultative Council.

Chirac, who on Sunday became the first foreign leader to address the Saudi-appointed Shura (consultative) Council, took advantage of his presence in the kingdom, home to Islam's holiest sites, to advocate tolerance and mutual respect at a time when Muslims across the world have been infuriated by the publication of cartoons deemed blasphemous to Prophet Mohammed.

"We have always condemned what some call the clash of civilizations, and which I call the clash of ignorances," he told reporters.

On regional issues, Chirac said he was "disappointed" by Iran's attitude in the crisis over its nuclear program, while stressing that the international community would not let up in its effort to convince Tehran to "respect its commitments" to suspend enrichment activities.

Eur, pardonnez-moi, M. le President, you are "condemning" cartoons but are "disappointed" by Iranian nuclear weapons research? Excuzez-moi, but are not Iran's actions "illegal and illegitimate"? Is that not what has brought Iran before the IAEA? Doesn't that rate a little "condemnation"?

PFFT (What is this?): French shinola 4 | French payday 0 | Rayonnement français 0

only 400 of the 673 hours that Chirac spent aboard his luxurious presidential jet in 2003 can be accounted for by official trips
Just trying to wear out the plane so Airbus can sell him a new one…

India trip:
You think that it was for the ship deal?
I kind of think it was also an effort to get some interest in India buying French reactors after the deal signed with Bush. Well, a little of both, I guess…

Andy,

France has been embarrassed out of the ship deal. Dumping your toxic waste at a deep discount on the third world is all fine and good as long as it doesn't get into the newspapers.

As for nuclear technology, well, it is America that is poised to be India's primeary vendor:

US LOBBY GROUP: INDIA-US NUCLEAR DEAL CAN OPEN UP $100 BILLION IN INVESTMENT

Regards,
DGB