The two candidates for the French presidency. Finance Minister Valery Giscard d’Estaing and Socialist leader Francois Mitterand, said today that if elected, they will work for even closer relations with the Arab states. The second, and final round, in the French presidential election will be held May 19. Public opinion polls give a slight edge to Giscard d’Estaing.
The Finance Minister, who runs with the backing of the Gaullist party, said in an interview over the French radio that he will continue Gen. de-Gaulle’s foreign policy and said that he will not change France’s Arab policy. Giscard d’Estaing said that he will try, however, to pursue a “symmetrical policy – a policy of friendship with the Arab states and one of trying to ensure Israel’s security and existence.”
Mitterand told the Libyan news agency “Arab Revolution” that if elected he will remain “loyal to the deep French interest and moral responsibilities which unite France to the Arab states.” France, he said, could and should strengthen its cooperation with the Mediterranean countries in the economic, cultural and political fields. Mitterand also said that he and his party fully support the “right” of the Palestinian people to self-determination.
After both candidates have tried to woo the Jewish electorate, the two now appear to try and reassure the pro-Arab pressure groups as well as the 100,000 French Moslems with voting rights in France, Mitterand, political observers here say, must also try to placate the extreme left-wing voters whose 2 1/2 percent are needed if he is to win the presidency. (By Edwin Eytan.)
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