France: U.N. Must Lead Reconstruction in Iraq

NPR | By Sylvia Poggioli

Published March 26, 2003 at 10:00 PM MST

French Foreign Minister Dominique de Villepin says the United Nations should lead the reconstruction and administration of post-war Iraq. At a speech in London, Villepin says the appearance of a U.S. military occupation must be avoided to ease tensions in the volatile Middle East region. NPR's Sylvia Poggioli reports.

Sylvia Poggioli

Sylvia Poggioli is senior European correspondent for NPR's International Desk covering political, economic, and cultural news in Italy, the Vatican, Western Europe, and the Balkans. Poggioli's on-air reporting and analysis have encompassed the fall of communism in Eastern Europe, the turbulent civil war in the former Yugoslavia, and how immigration has transformed European societies.

See stories by Sylvia Poggioli