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French President Nicolas Sarkozy. (Reuters)



Last update - 14:31 09/07/2007


Sarkozy vows to use all power at disposal to free captive IDF troops

By Jack Khourie, Haaretz Correspondent and News Agencies

In a meeting with family members of abducted IDF soldiers, French President Nicolas Sarkozy said Monday he would use all the power at his disposal to return the three servicemen home safely.

Sarkozy spoke in depth on the matter of Gilad Shalit who holds joint Israeli and French citizenship, saying he considers the IDF Corporal kidnapped by Hamas over a year ago to be a fully fledged French national.

"He promised us that he's doing all the efforts he can in this matter," Gilad Shalit's father, Noam Shalit, said in English after the meeting. "He considers my son as a French citizen as well as an Israeli soldier.|




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The President added that as such, he would involve himself in talks with Palestinian authorities to secure Shalit's return as soon as possible.

Addressing the issue of IDF soldiers Eldad Regev and Udi Goldwasser who were abducted by Hezbollah last summer in a move that sparked the Second Lebanon War, Sarkozy said he considers Hezbollah to be a terrorist organization.

He said his estimation of Hezbollah has not changed despite his government's issuing of permission of members of the Islamic group to visit France for talks with rival Lebanese factions on the future of the Middle Eastern country.

He pledged to the families to raise the issue of the abducted soldiers with Lebanese representatives when they next met.

Family members of the abducted soldiers called the meeting "very positive," and expressed hope that France would use its clout in the Middle East, particularly in the Lebanese and Palestinian arenas, to expedite the return of their loved ones from captivity.

A meeting between the delegation of family members and French Foreign Minister Bernard Kushner is scheduled later Monday.