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France confirms it will not join Trump’s Board of Peace
France has confirmed it will not join Trump’s proposed “Board of Peace” for now, citing concerns that its charter does not align with UN resolutions on Gaza.
A Foreign Ministry spokesperson said the document does not correspond with a UN-backed framework to resolve the war in Gaza and includes provisions that conflict with the UN Charter.
“It was not corresponding on the one hand with the pure Gaza mandate, which is not even mentioned, and on the other hand, there are elements of this charter which are contrary to the United Nations charter,” spokesperson Pascal Confavreux said.
The comments follow remarks by Foreign Minister Jean-Noel Barrot, who said Paris supports the US peace plan but opposes the creation of a new organisation outside existing multilateral structures.
‘Very serious red flags’ with Board of Peace, says Ireland’s deputy PM
There are very serious red flags with Trump’s “Board of Peace”, Ireland’s deputy premier has said, adding that he could not see a scenario in which Ireland takes part in the group as it is currently constructed.
The board was initially expected to be a small group of figures overseeing the ceasefire in the Middle East, but appears to have evolved into something more wide-reaching, in which dozens of countries have been invited to participate.
Simon Harris said that the proposal has very serious red flags, including no mention of Gaza and the involvement of Putin. He said the original plan was to create a board to oversee a peace plan for Gaza, which was endorsed by the UN in November.
“Let me also be very clear, what we are seeing today at this signing ceremony could not be further removed from that original conversation,” he said.
We speak to Greek economist Yanis Varoufakis about the United States under Donald Trump and its attempts to reshape the post-World War II international consensus. “Trump has all his work done for him by placid European centrists who went along with the policy of trashing international law and creating the circumstances for him to create his private company and say, 'Right, I'm taking over the world,’” laments Varoufakis as he draws a connection between Trump’s pay-to-play diplomacy and the mercantalist policies of European colonial powers.
Varoufakis comments on plans for the reoccupation of Gaza by the U.S.-led “Board of Peace,” which signed its founding charter this week; Trump’s designs on the Danish territory of Greenland; and European leaders’ ineffectual, largely symbolic resistance to Trump’s assertion of U.S. supremacy on the world stage.
