World now more dangerous: France

The world is a more dangerous place because of the US-led war in Iraq, which may have toppled Saddam Hussein but also unleashed postwar violence and an increase in terrorism, the French foreign minister said today.

“This is a belief that I have never stopped expressing,” Foreign Minister Dominique de Villepin told Le Monde newspaper.

“We have to look reality in the face: we have entered into a more dangerous and unstable world, which requires the mobilisation of the entire international community,” de Villepin said.

Assertions by the administration of US President George Bush that ousting Saddam would make the world a safer place proved not to be true, de Villepin said.

“Terrorism didn’t exist in Iraq before,” de Villepin said. “Today, it is one of the world’s principal sources of world terrorism.”

De Villepin called again on the United States to respect a June 30 deadline for the Americans to hand over power to the Iraqis.