French Interior Minister Nicolas Sarkozy consolidated his position as the leading Gaullist candidate in next year's presidential elections, as former opponents rallied behind him at a high-profile party meeting.
Pledging to break with the past and urging a "new French model," Sarkozy addressed his closing speech on Sunday to young people, courting a generation that has traditionally voted for the left. He vowed to lower unemployment to 5 percent by 2012, promised reform of the education system and proposed mandatory community service for youths.
"A break is needed," Sarkozy, leader of the governing Union for a Popular Movement, told 6,000 young delegates. "If we are together, united and determined, everything is possible."
PHOTO: EPA
Several longtime supporters of President Jacques Chirac and Prime Minister Dominique de Villepin, Sarkozy's main rivals in recent years, used the three-day conference in Marseille to express support for the interior minister. Among them were Budget Minister Jean-Francois Cope and Sports Minister Jean-Francois Lamour.
Villepin himself appeared to soften his opposition to Sarkozy, albeit without explicitly endorsing his candidacy.
"Thank you Nicolas!" said Villepin on Friday, the opening day of the meeting. "Nicolas, you are a minister of state who is energetic, strong-willed and courageous. I give you all my gratitude."
The show of unity on the right comes one week after a similar gathering of the opposition Socialist Party was overshadowed by divisive squabbling among half a dozen potential candidates, several of whom stepped up their attacks on Segolene Royal, the front-runner in opinion polls on the left.
For three years the rivalry between Sarkozy on one side and Chirac and his protege Villepin on the other dominated the headlines. But eight months ahead of the presidential poll, Sarkozy appears to have outdistanced them both.
While Chirac has not ruled out running for a third term, and Villepin has seen his popularity recover somewhat with falling jobless figures, neither of the two comes close to Sarkozy in opinion polls.
"For the moment there is no rival on the horizon for Sarkozy," said Emmanuel Riviere, head of political studies at the TNS Sofres polling institute.
The two-round election is scheduled to take place in late April and early May.
If Sarkozy has so far succeeded in fending off his main rivals on the right, winning against the Socialist Party will be harder, Riviere said.
After courting voters on the right with a tough line on immigration and law and order, Sarkozy now appears to be trying to soften his image in a bid to win votes in the center.
On Sunday, he sought to woo young voters by proposing to create interest-free loans for students who want to set up a business, as well as special education savings accounts. He appeared to criticize a flexible work contract the government introduced a year ago, which allows small firms to fire employees without justification during the first two years after they are hired.
"I want society to allow you to become adults, adults like others," Sarkozy said. "Not adults who are put to the test for two years and can be fired without explanation."
CONFRONTATION: The water cannon attack was the second this month on the Philippine supply boat ‘Unaizah May 4,’ after an incident on March 5 The China Coast Guard yesterday morning blocked a Philippine supply vessel and damaged it with water cannons near a reef off the Southeast Asian country, the Philippines said. The Philippine military released video of what it said was a nearly hour-long attack off the Second Thomas Shoal (Renai Shoal, 仁愛暗沙) in the contested South China Sea, where Chinese ships have unleashed water cannons and collided with Philippine vessels in similar standoffs in the past few months. The China Coast Guard and other vessels “once again harassed, blocked, deployed water cannons, and executed dangerous maneuvers” against a routine rotation and resupply mission to
GLOBAL COMBAT AIR PROGRAM: The potential purchasers would be limited to the 15 nations with which Tokyo has signed defense partnership and equipment transfer deals Japan’s Cabinet yesterday approved a plan to sell future next-generation fighter jets that it is developing with the UK and Italy to other nations, in the latest move away from the country’s post-World War II pacifist principles. The contentious decision to allow international arms sales is expected to help secure Japan’s role in the joint fighter jet project, and is part of a move to build up the Japanese arms industry and bolster its role in global security. The Cabinet also endorsed a revision to Japan’s arms equipment and technology transfer guidelines to allow coproduced lethal weapons to be sold to nations
Thousands of devotees, some in a state of trance, gathered at a Buddhist temple on the outskirts of Bangkok renowned for sacred tattoos known as Sak Yant, paying their respects to a revered monk who mastered the practice and seeking purification. The gathering at Wat Bang Phra Buddhist temple is part of a Thai Wai Khru ritual in which devotees pay homage to Luang Phor Pern, the temple’s formal abbot, who died in 2002. He had a reputation for refining and popularizing the temple’s Sak Yant tattoo style. The idea that tattoos confer magical powers has existed in many parts of Asia
ON ALERT: A Russian cruise missile crossed into Polish airspace for about 40 seconds, the Polish military said, adding that it is constantly monitoring the war to protect its airspace Ukraine’s capital, Kyiv, and the western region of Lviv early yesterday came under a “massive” Russian air attack, officials said, while a Russian cruise missile breached Polish airspace, the Polish military said. Russia and Ukraine have been engaged in a series of deadly aerial attacks, with yesterday’s strikes coming a day after the Russian military said it had seized the Ukrainian village of Ivanivske, west of Bakhmut. A militant attack on a Moscow concert hall on Friday that killed at least 133 people also became a new flash point between the two archrivals. “Explosions in the capital. Air defense is working. Do not