PARIS: France’s defense minister said she has canceled talks with her UK counterpart amid the row prompted by a new security deal between Britain, the US and Australia, BBC reported.
BBC said Paris is angry after Australia signed the Aukus pact to build nuclear-powered submarines, pulling out of a major contract with France in the process.
UK Prime Minister Boris Johnson said France had nothing to worry about from the deal.
But Florence Parly’s meeting with UK Defence Secretary Ben Wallace in London this week has been called off, according to BBC.
Lord Ricketts, a former British ambassador to France who was due to co-chair the two days of talks, confirmed the meeting had been “postponed to a later date”.
French foreign minister Jean-Yves Le Drian has described it as a “stab in the back” that constituted “unacceptable behavior between allies and partners”.
And in a virtually unprecedented step among allies, French President Emmanuel Macron ordered the recall of the French ambassadors to Washington and Canberra, the report added.
(With inputs from BBC)
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