SARKOZY LAUNCHES CAMPAIGN TO SAVE FRANCE

UK GUARDIAN:

Nicolas Sarkozy, France's most popular politician, yesterday set out his stall for the 2007 presidential elections, proposing major reforms to the country's power structure and declaring he was determined to "embody its future". In a new year's address to the media, the ambitious interior minister, freshly reunited with his wife and most valued aide Cecilia after an eight-month separation, also said EU enlargement should be frozen until the bloc has agreed a watered down and purely practical constitution. ... The interior minister, who turns 51 this month, said France's worst civil disorder since the 1968 student-worker uprising "reflected the extent of the failure of our public policies" over the past 30 years.

UK INDEPENDENT: Sarkozy launches presidency bid with assault on 'do nothing' Chirac

The French Interior Minister, Nicolas Sarkozy, has launched a campaign for the presidency in all but name, demanding radical changes in France's aloof style of government. His new year speech to the press yesterday amounted to a direct assault on the record and "feel-good" rhetoric of his nominal bosses, President Jacques Chirac and the Prime Minister, Dominique de Villepin. ...

Without mentioning him by name, M. Sarkozy also mocked a call by M. de Villepin the previous day for France to be happy and confident and not dwell on its economic or social problems. Such attempts to "jump-start" French "greatness" were inappropriate from a "powerless state... stuck in its own debt," M. Sarkozy said. Although the presidential election is not due until May 2007, this amounted to an early declaration of political war by M. Sarkozy on his own side. France now faces the bizarre prospect of a year of merciless electoral combat between the three most important figures in its centre-right government. ...

... M. Sarkozy went far beyond his briefs as Interior Minister and leader of the ruling UMP (Union pour un Mouvement Populaire) party. He called for the biggest shake-up in the structure of French government in almost 50 years. If he was elected President, he implied, he would turn the presidency into, in effect, a "super" prime ministership, directly accountable to parliament and responsible for the day-to-day running of the government. ... As President, M. Sarkozy implied, he would try to revive the first part of the proposed EU treaty, which set out to streamline European decision-making. This could be put to the French, and other national parliaments, without a new referendum, M. Sarkozy suggested. In the meantime, there should be a freeze on enlargement of the EU.

PEOPLE'S DAILY:

French Interior Minister Nicolas Sarkozy called on the European Union (EU) on Thursday to suspend its enlargement until the 25-nation bloc has reformed its institutions. "I think it necessary not to proceed with any new enlargements as long as new institutions have not been adopted," Sarkozy said in a policy speech at his traditional New Year gathering with reporters.

AP:

His feisty nature, straight-talk and policy proposals have set him apart from the mainstream left and right. Sarkozy says the French economic model no longer works; he champions strong policing and tougher immigration controls; he opposes Turkey's aspirations to join the European Union; he says France must adjust its secular foundations to better integrate its 5 million Muslims.

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