In Montpellier, Foreign Minister Jean-Noël Barrot came to defend, this Friday, April 17, a diplomacy that can be economical and raise awareness of international issues. In front of entrepreneurs, students and researchers, he insisted on the role of citizens and diasporas in a global context marked by geopolitical tensions.
“What am I doing in Montpellier while Hormuz is blocked and Russia is brutalizing Ukraine?” Jean-Nöel Barrot opened the debate from the first minutes of a marathon day spent in Montpellier, this Friday April 17. Answer : “I am convinced that faced with the brutalization of the world and its upheavals, each citizen has a role to play, at their own level, to strengthen international ties.” The Minister for Europe and Foreign Affairs, whose partner is from Montpellier, came above all to do educational work and explain France’s action internationally.
Facing business leaders, researchers, students and members of the diasporas
With business leaders, first. In the premises of the Chamber of Commerce and Industry, he defended diplomacy “which is not only the relationship between States, but also a lever at the service of our businesses in a context where world disorders have very direct consequences.” And the president of the CCI, André Deljarry, recalled the €53 billion in exports – €10 billion in the Middle East alone – and the €39 billion in products imported by French companies.
Entrepreneurs, then students from the Faculty of Law and high school students from Jules Guesde, before researchers from the ICM and CIRAD. Jean-Noël Barrot made a vast tour of the “world city that is Montpellier” and its actors. To the House of International Relations where a charter drawn up during the last Euro Africa biennial was signed, recalling the importance of the role of diasporas in the intensification of international trade. It was finally in front of a panel of Montpellier residents that the minister concluded his visit, after a visit to Midi Libre.
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