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Thursday, March 28, 2024

Secretary Antony J. Blinken and French Minister of Europe and Foreign Affairs Catherine Colonna Before Their Meeting

SECRETARY BLINKEN:  Well, good evening, everyone.  I think the most – among the most significant developments of the last few days is the fact that the minister and I celebrated our birthdays on the same day.  So we’ve both been dealing with an abundance of celebration and cake from our counterparts, but we’re also dealing with – having covered the waterfront in the G7 already – virtually every part of the world – the very strong convergence of views, of course, between us and also among our G7 partners, on the approach to take to a series of very, very challenging issues.  And the work that the United States and France have been doing together, as well as the work we’re doing within the G7 and in other organizations, is making, I think, a very profound difference in our ability to actually achieve results.  But here again, the last day has only reinforced the convergence of views that we have on the approach to the most important issues of the day, and I look forward to pursuing the conversation.

FOREIGN MINISTER COLONNA:  Thank you so much, Tony.  Good evening, everyone.  I do confirm that yesterday was an important day for both of us and for the G7 (inaudible) because we had an interesting, sincere, direct, and useful discussion on a series of issues.  France and the U.S. are good allies, strong allies, organized, and it’s my pleasure to have another conversation with Secretary Blinken.  We covered already a lot of ground, got so many challenges we’re facing today – too many tensions clearly and a much needed cooperation between the G7 countries and beyond.  So we try to work on that very positive outcome so far.  We’re united.  We’re giving clearly the same signal to the rest of the world that any situation that requires that the respect of international law is a precondition to the rest.  This is – will, I hope, will be one of the outcome of this G7 meeting.  Thank you.

Official news published at https://www.state.gov/secretary-antony-j-blinken-and-french-minister-of-europe-and-foreign-affairs-catherine-colonna-before-their-meeting/

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