ACCORD IN PARIS TALKS

Press, Volume CVI, Issue 31269, 16 January 1967, Page 13

ACCORD IN PARIS TALKS

(N.Z.P.A.-Reuter —Copyright) PARIS, Jan. 15. France and West Germany breathed new life into their friendship alliance in summit talks in Paris this week-end, but the French apparently sounded a negative note on the question of British entry into the Common Market.

The future of the Common Market was discussed at length in talks between West German Chancellor, Dr. Kurt Georg Kiesinger, and President de Gaulle. The Chancellor said the talks produced a wide area of accord. But a high-level German source said that the British Prime Minister faced

a very difficult task in seeking a French change of heart ove.: British membership when he comes to Paris later this month. Another German source said the feeling could still be detected in France that Britain was too closely linked with the United States to be a desirable European partner.

Dr. Kiesinger and President de Gaulle agreed that they should await the outcome of Mr Wilson’s tour of Common Market capitals before embarking on detailed examination of the problem of British entry into the six-nation community, informed sources reported. In the talks. Dr. Kiesinger underlined his Government’s support for British entry as long as Britain agreed to abide by the rules set down in the Rome Treaty founding the community. Both he and the French President welcomed Italy’s proposal for a Rome summit of the Six in the spring, which would provide a forum for debate on extensions of the Common Market. The new German Chancellor described the two-day talks as “absolute reanimation” of the 1963 FrancoGerman treaty, which has proved Ineffective in recent

years in preventing a steady deterioration in relations between the two countries. Although Dr. Kiesinger and his Foreign Minister, Mr Willy Brandt, did not shrink from an evaluation of issues on which Paris and Bonn do not see eye to eye, the talks went far better than even optimists had hoped, informants reported. Dr. Kiesinger told reporters after yesterday’s hour-long meeting at the Elysee Palace: “Of course, differences remain between us but there is a wide area of accord.” He forecast that co-operation between France and Germany would overcome European divisions. President de Gaulle said at the final session yesterday morning: “Even if sometimes French and German approaches are not always the same, there is, nonetheless, necessity, usefulness, and satisfaction in co-operation between French and Germans. “This is in the spirit and letter of the 1963 treaty which remains alive. It was indeed sometimes in the shadows but now it has emerged into light again.” At the airport after bidding farewell to Dr. Kiesinger and Mr Brandt when they flew home, the French Foreign

Minister, Mr Couve de Murville, told reporters: “There are no basic or important disagreements between us on any subject.” Although this sentiment was echoed in the German delegation, diplomatic observers noted that such issues as French opposition to N.A.T.O. military integration continue to present major points of difference. West Germany’s claim that the Oder-Neisse frontier cannot be considered a permanent border with Poland was side-stepped in the talks. President de Gaulle is known to believe that West Germany would be welladvised to accept the border.