Ambassador Franck Gellet, Paris’ special envoy to Syria, paid a discreet visit Aug. 30 to Moscow, where he and Russian experts discussed the Syrian crisis. French Foreign Minister Jean-Yves Le Drian visited Moscow Sept. 8 and met with his Russian counterpart, Sergey Lavrov. Paris might be tempted to play a similar “hawkish card” in Syria, where economic opportunities look far less promising than in Iran. Italy felt sidelined by the French initiative, and Libyan neighbors Algeria, Tunisia and Egypt displayed a high degree of skepticism, having laid down their own tripartite initiative in recent months. Aligning their respective assets and influence on the various actors of the Libyan stage could provide Paris and Moscow with serious ability to deliver tangible results.

Source: The North Africa Journal September 21, 2017 23:26 UTC