Monday marked the first anniversary of the Summit on the Mediterranean, which was convened by President Nicholas Sarkozy last year in Paris, on the eve of Bastille Day. The Summit, which launched the Union for the Mediterranean, was going to launch “non-political” projects in order to overcome the political struggles between states in the Mediterranean region. Sarkozy's ambition was to begin a huge, much-needed project to clean up the Mediterranean. But one year after its launch, nothing has been accomplished. A visitor to Beirut, Alexandria or Algiers can observe the shore and coast pollution. In Lebanon, for example, the sea is a vital source of wealth and tourism activity, but it has turned into a waste dump, because the country lacks treatment plants. This is the case in a number of Mediterranean countries, not to mention the situation of Gaza, which is suffering from Israeli occupation, poverty, war and destruction, and where the sea has become a dump for everything. Israel is blockading Gaza and closing it down; no one can do anything in the face of the human and environmental catastrophe from which the Palestinians in this strip of land suffer. What has happened to the clean-up plan? The resources of the Mediterranean are being eaten up by pollution, and there is still discussion about the Union for the Mediterranean's clean-up plan. We should see a tangible beginning to the project, and not just talk about the plan. Why doesn't France, along with its European partners from states on the Mediterranean, work to participate with countries like Lebanon, Egypt or others to build waste treatment plants, instead of seeing the Mediterranean become a waste dump for the third world's refuse? The shores of Lebanon, Egypt, Algeria or Libya, or the Palestinian and Syrian coasts, are all beautiful Mediterranean coasts, and the sea is a vital human treasure with tourism benefits. But it is polluted and subject to environmental disaster everywhere along the sea's southern shores. As for the boycott, Sarkozy wanted change in France. He celebrated the anniversary of the French Revolution Tuesday with austerity. His media team decided to not invite Arab journalists, since hosting them at the Elysees Palace would be costly. The event was limited to a number of journalists from leading French newspapers, like Le Figaro and Le Monde, and other television media, which the French president needs. He does not need the Middle East press, like his predecessors Valery Giscard d'Estaing, Francois Mitterrand and Jacques Chirac. The new presidency is for shunning some journalists while actively selecting the elite of the French and American press, which the presidential palace's media circles consider important. This cold shoulder is strange after a 30-year tradition of the French presidency inviting journalists accredited in France to cover the presidency. The pretext is austerity, and the cold shoulder is a new style being used to cover the travels of President Sarkozy. In the past, there was an Airbus used by the French Air Force, set aside for transporting the press accompanying the president on official trips abroad. Travel aboard the plane was paid for by the newspaper that wanted to cover the French president's trip to a given country. This was the tradition since the presidency of George Pompidou. Today, the journalist who wishes to cover a presidential visit must travel by himself, aboard an ordinary commercial plane, which was also justified in the name of austerity, even though the visit and travel had been covered entirely by the journalist who chose to accompany a given presidential visit. All of these measures are strange, since there are military Airbus planes that continue to transport the president's security detail, and they travel on a plane holding both journalists and security people. Sarkozy wants to appear as a president of change, but the change he wants is not always in the interest of his image, or the image of France. He always comes up with exciting and ambitious ideas, like the Union of the Mediterranean, but is more effective in defending such ideas, because of his skill in dealing with the media and convincing rhetoric, but less effective in pushing ahead with a tangible project, like cleaning up the Mediterranean. As for his austerity measures, they certainly do not require his personal intervention; such steps do more to mar his presidential image than demonstrate his effectiveness with regard to saving money. The US administration is also taking austerity measures, but the US Embassy in Paris did not back away from inviting accredited Arab journalists in France to its 4th of July celebrations!
