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Barack Obama snubs Britain by saying France is his biggest ally
by Don Mackay, Daily Mirror 12/01/2011
BARACK Obama holds out his hand to a delighted Nicolas Sarkozy – after handing out a sensational slap in the face for David Cameron.
President Obama told French leader Mr Sarkozy that no country had closer ties with America than France.
It shatters the idea that Britain still has a special relationship with the US.
Mr Obama said: “We don’t have a stronger friend and stronger ally than Nicolas Sarkozy and the French people.”
The remarks will infuriate the thousands of British troops who have risked their lives in Iraq and Afghanistan. The UK has lost 349 troops in the war against the Taliban – seven times as many as France.
There are more than 10,000 British soldiers serving in Helmand province, compared with just 3,850 from France.
Mr Obama’s remarks will be seen as an embarrassing rebuff to Mr Cameron because no US president in modern times has described France as America’s closest ally.
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And it comes after Mr Sarkozy made a series of cutting remarks about Mr Obama after he was elected in 2008. The French President was recorded saying: “Obama has never run a ministry.
“There are a certain number of things on which he has no position.
“And he is not always up to standard on decision-making and efficiency.”
And at a D-Day memorial service, Mr Sarkozy joked: “I’m going to ask him to walk on the Channel and he’ll do it, you’ll see.”
President Obama’s remarks, made during Mr Sarkozy’s visit to the White House, will add fuel to the fire in British diplomatic circles that the American leader does not value the special relationship with the UK that was first mentioned by Winston Churchill in 1946.
Tory MP Patrick Mercer, a former commander of the Sherwood Foresters regiment, says he is fed up with Mr Obama’s attitude to Britain.
It also follows Gordon Brown’s trip to the UN in New York in 2009 when he had several requests for a meeting with Mr Obama turned down.
Some commentators say his attitude stems from the time when his grandad was jailed in Kenya in 1949. Hussein Onyango Obama was imprisoned for two years and allegedly tortured for information on the movement trying to gain independence from Britain.
by Don Mackay, Daily Mirror 12/01/2011
BARACK Obama holds out his hand to a delighted Nicolas Sarkozy – after handing out a sensational slap in the face for David Cameron.
President Obama told French leader Mr Sarkozy that no country had closer ties with America than France.
It shatters the idea that Britain still has a special relationship with the US.
Mr Obama said: “We don’t have a stronger friend and stronger ally than Nicolas Sarkozy and the French people.”
The remarks will infuriate the thousands of British troops who have risked their lives in Iraq and Afghanistan. The UK has lost 349 troops in the war against the Taliban – seven times as many as France.
There are more than 10,000 British soldiers serving in Helmand province, compared with just 3,850 from France.
Mr Obama’s remarks will be seen as an embarrassing rebuff to Mr Cameron because no US president in modern times has described France as America’s closest ally.
Advertisement - article continues below »
And it comes after Mr Sarkozy made a series of cutting remarks about Mr Obama after he was elected in 2008. The French President was recorded saying: “Obama has never run a ministry.
“There are a certain number of things on which he has no position.
“And he is not always up to standard on decision-making and efficiency.”
And at a D-Day memorial service, Mr Sarkozy joked: “I’m going to ask him to walk on the Channel and he’ll do it, you’ll see.”
President Obama’s remarks, made during Mr Sarkozy’s visit to the White House, will add fuel to the fire in British diplomatic circles that the American leader does not value the special relationship with the UK that was first mentioned by Winston Churchill in 1946.
Tory MP Patrick Mercer, a former commander of the Sherwood Foresters regiment, says he is fed up with Mr Obama’s attitude to Britain.
It also follows Gordon Brown’s trip to the UN in New York in 2009 when he had several requests for a meeting with Mr Obama turned down.
Some commentators say his attitude stems from the time when his grandad was jailed in Kenya in 1949. Hussein Onyango Obama was imprisoned for two years and allegedly tortured for information on the movement trying to gain independence from Britain.
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