It is finally the current French ambassador in London, Catherine Colonna, who replaces Jean-Yves Le Drian at the Ministry for Europe and Foreign Affairs. Aged 66, this diplomat with a long career has the reputation of being a rigorous professional, accustomed to crisis management, from monitoring the war in Iraq in 2003 to managing the Brexit file in recent years.
Entrance to the Quai d’Orsay on leaving the National School of Administration (ENA), Mme Colonna was one of the faces of French diplomacy during the Chirac years. She was also the spokesperson for the presidency from 1995 to 2004, a record longevity. During the Iraq crisis, which in the early 2000s led to a serious deterioration in Franco-American relations, she also forcefully defended the French refusal to take part in the war started in 2003 by the United States.
After the Elysée, the diplomat made a brief stint in 2004 at the head of the National Center for Cinematography (CNC), a regulatory and funding body for French cinema, before returning to public affairs in 2005, when she was appointed Minister Delegate for European Affairs in the Villepin government until 2007. She then joined UNESCO before working in the private sector.
A particularly delicate position in the context of Brexit
French Ambassador to Rome from 2014 to 2017, where she was at the forefront of the migration crisis, Catherine Colonna was appointed to London in mid-2019, just before the signing of the Brexit treaty between the United Kingdom and the European Union . This post proved to be particularly delicate, relations between London and Paris having continued to deteriorate after the arrival of Boris Johnson in Downing Street.
France and the United Kingdom disagreed on fishing, but above all on migration, the British government accusing France of not sufficiently monitoring its coasts or preventing Channel crossings. The two years of the pandemic have not helped to forge ties with a conservative government that is otherwise quick to exploit its dissensions with Paris for the purposes of pure domestic politics.
The tension peaked in September 2021 after the announcement of the AUKUS defense alliance, between Australia, the United States and the United Kingdom. AUKUS deprived France of a very substantial submarine delivery contract in Canberra and was experienced as a humiliation at the Quai d’Orsay. Mme Colonna officially focused on the positive aspects of the Franco-British relationship, cultural and historical, avoiding antagonistic positions on social networks.
On Friday, the person concerned reacted soberly to her appointment on Twitterwriting: “A huge thank you to the President of the Republic and to the Prime Minister for the trust and honor they have placed in me. » First of its foreign counterparts to reactAnnalena Baerbock, the head of German diplomacy, welcomed the arrival of“an enthusiastic partner for a strong Europe in the world”.
His appointment comes at a time when the Quai d’Orsay is in the throes of « malaise », where a strike call was launched for June 2 by six unions and a group of 400 young diplomats. They protest against an accumulation of reforms, particularly those implementing the “extinguishing” progressive by 2023 of the prestigious diplomatic corps.