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UKRAINE

Macron urges Iran to stop backing Russia in Ukraine

French President Emmanuel Macron on Saturday urged his Iranian counterpart Ebrahim Raisi to "immediately end" Tehran's support for Russia's invasion of Ukraine, which involves supplying Moscow with attack drones, the Elysee said.

Macron urges Iran to stop backing Russia in Ukraine
France's President Emmanuel Macron at the Elysee Palace in Paris, on June 9, 2023. Photo: Ludovic MARIN/AFP.

French President Emmanuel Macron on Saturday urged his Iranian counterpart Ebrahim Raisi to “immediately end” Tehran’s support for Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, which involves supplying Moscow with attack drones, the Elysee said.

Macron in a telephone call underlined the serious “security and humanitarian consequences” of Iran’s drone deliveries “and urged Tehran to immediately end the support it thus gives to Russia’s war of aggression against Ukraine”, said a statement.

The call came a day after White House national security spokesman John Kirby said Russia was receiving materials from Iran to build a drone factory on its territory that “could be fully operational early next year”.

The White House released a satellite image of the location of the prospective plant in the Alabuga special economic zone, some 900 kilometres (560 miles) east of Moscow.

“The Russia-Iran military partnership appears to be deepening,” Kirby said in a statement, citing US intelligence information.

The United States has said that Russia has received hundreds of Iranian attack drones to attack Kyiv and “terrorise” Ukrainians, a charge denied by Tehran.

According to US data, the drones are built in Iran, shipped across the Caspian Sea “and then used operationally by Russian forces against Ukraine”, Kirby said.

The White House said it would release a new government advisory to assist businesses and governments “to ensure they are not inadvertently contributing to Iran’s (drone) program”

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POLITICS

New Caledonia airport to reopen Monday, curfew reduced: authorities

New Caledonia's main international airport will reopen from Monday after being shut last month during a spate of deadly unrest, the high commission in the French Pacific territory said, adding a curfew would also be reduced.

New Caledonia airport to reopen Monday, curfew reduced: authorities

The commission said Sunday that it had “decided to reopen the airport during the day” and to “push back to 8:00 pm (from 6:00 pm) the start of the curfew as of Monday”.

The measures had been introduced after violence broke out on May 13 over a controversial voting reform that would have allowed long-term residents to participate in local polls.

The archipelago’s Indigenous Kanaks feared the move would dilute their vote, putting hopes for eventually winning independence definitively out of reach.

READ ALSO: Explained: What’s behind the violence on French island of New Caledonia?

Barricades, skirmishes with the police and looting left nine dead and hundreds injured, and inflicted hundreds of millions of euros in damage.

The full resumption of flights at Tontouta airport was made possible by the reopening of an expressway linking it to the capital Noumea that had been blocked by demonstrators, the commission said.

Previously the airport was only handling a small number of flights with special exemptions.

Meanwhile, the curfew, which runs until 6:00 am, was reduced “in light of the improvement in the situation and in order to facilitate the gradual return to normal life”, the commission added.

French President Emmanuel Macron had announced on Wednesday that the voting reform that touched off the unrest would be “suspended” in light of snap parliamentary polls.

Instead he aimed to “give full voice to local dialogue and the restoration of order”, he told reporters.

Although approved by both France’s National Assembly and Senate, the reform had been waiting on a constitutional congress of both houses to become part of the basic law.

Caledonian pro-independence movements had already considered reform dead given Macron’s call for snap elections.

“This should be a time for rebuilding peace and social ties,” the Kanak Liberation Party (Palika) said Wednesday before the announcement.

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