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French ambassador named Georgian foreign minister

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  • French ambassador named Georgian foreign minister

    French ambassador named Georgian foreign minister


    TBILISI, Georgia (Reuters) - Georgia's President Mikhail Saakashvili
    picked France's ambassador in Tbilisi to be his foreign minister
    Thursday, saying he had cleared the appointment with French President
    Jacques Chirac.

    Saakashvili said 51-year-old Salome Zurabishvili, a descendant of 19th
    century Georgian writer Niko Nikoladze, was a diplomat of
    international standing whose family had emigrated to France early in
    the 20th century.

    He told a news conference he believed the appointment was
    "unprecedented in the history of diplomacy." Diplomats are normally
    expected to remain loyal to their own country and not take up jobs in
    foreign governments.

    He said he would grant her Georgian citizenship in addition to her
    French passport, a dual status the constitution allowed in special
    circumstances.

    Zurabishvili has worked in the United States, the European Union and
    NATO and headed the international department of France's national
    security general secretariat until taking up her post in Georgia.

    After the fall of communism, many people whose families had migrated
    to Western Europe and the United States returned to their Eastern
    European roots. A U.S. lawyer, for instance, served for a short time
    as foreign minister in Transcaucasian neighbor Armenia in the 1990s.

    Saakashvili himself is a U.S.-trained lawyer who led a bloodless coup
    last November that brought down veteran leader Eduard Shevardnadze, a
    former Soviet foreign minister.

    Saakashvili won a landslide election victory in January and promised
    to integrate the republic into NATO, the European Union and the
    European mainstream.

    03/11/04 14:14 ET
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