France calls for global action to combat Isis

France has called for an international conference to discuss ways of combating Islamist militants who have seized large parts of Syria and Iraq.

“We have to come up with a global strategy to fight this group, which is structured, has significant financing, very sophisticated weapons and threatens countries like Iraq, Syria and Lebanon,” said President François Hollande.

Confirming that France was supplying “sophisticated weapons” to Kurdish forces fighting the jihadis in northern Iraq, Mr Hollande said he would shortly propose a conference on security in Iraq and what he called “the struggle” against the Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant, known as Isis.

“We can no longer keep to the traditional debate of intervention or non-intervention,” he said in an interview with Le Monde newspaper published on Wednesday.

Mr Hollande also confirmed that France was supplying weapons to so-called moderate rebels in Syria who have been eclipsed by Isis over the past year, although he said only that these supplies “conform to European commitments”.

Paris backed a tough approach last year by the west in support of mainstream rebels fighting the rule of Syrian president Bashar al-Assad, including military strikes against the regime after its apparent use of chemical weapons. It was dismayed when both the UK and he US backed off from taking military action.
“The international community carries a very grave responsibility for what has happened in Syria,” Mr Hollande said.
He said that had the west taken stronger action to force a transitional government in Syria “we would not have had the Islamic State [Isis]”.
He added: “If, a year ago, we had had a sufficient reaction by the great powers to the use of chemical weapons, we would not have been faced by this terrible choice between a dictator and a terrorist group.”