[Please note that only the original French text issued by the French Ministry of Foreign Affairs may be considered official.]

. . .

Q. - (…) Is France actually seeking to get sanctions against Iran at European level?

Our position is clear. It's been reasserted several times by the various leaders responsible for expressing it. Our demand is that Iran, first of all, comply with the international community's requirements. These have been laid down very clearly in the Security Council resolutions.

To get Iran to comply with these demands from the international community, we consider that the pressure has to be maintained since the pressure already exerted has led to a first movement which is the agreement made with the IAEA on the past activities. (…)

Q. - (…) We've gone from a decision on sanctions to recommendations which haven't got the force of a European decision. Has France failed to convince her partners? Are there European reservations vis-à-vis the French proposal?

I see no failure nor contradiction. There are discussions going on in the framework of the European Union, ongoing discussions at the Security Council and ongoing discussions in the UE3 +3.

We're working and discussing new sanctions in these different fora. We are pursuing our consultations. (…)

Q. - But President Sarkozy stated yesterday, in his interview on the main French television channels that the Iranian nuclear programme has a military purpose. Yet the IAEA hasn't confirmed this. Have you got any information allowing you to state that the aim of the Iranian nuclear programme is in the military domain?

We've already said, several times, that we had extremely serious doubts regarding the civilian nature of the current Iranian nuclear programme and, indeed, President Sarkozy said yesterday that Iran is trying to acquire the nuclear bomb". (…)

. . .