ALGIERS - French President Jacques Chirac on Thursday ruled out any negotiations with terrorists as he paid a lightening visit to Algeria, and voiced concern about the peace process in the Middle East.
"No negotiation is possible with terrorists," Chirac told reporters in reply to a purported peace offer by Osama bin Laden to European states who pull their troops out of Muslim countries.
"Terrorism is a barbarous act which attacks innocent people, and which cannot be justified by any reason or any cause," he said.
France, which opposed the US-led invasion of Iraq in March 2003, has no forces in the country. Two French journalists kidnapped in Iraq earlier this week were released unharmed.
But Islamic extremists have targeted French interests elsewhere, notably in May 2002 when 11 French naval engineers were killed by a bomb in the Pakistani city of Karachi, and in October that same year when a French oil tanker in a Yemeni port was holed in a bomb attack.
Chirac, in Algiers for brief talks with Algerian President Abdelaziz Bouteflika, proposed holding an inter-Iraqi conference to help smooth the way towards the handover to an Iraqi authority by the US-led coalition, planned for June 30.
He said there "must be a swift transfer of sovereignty, full and visible, to the Iraqis themselves, to put in place Iraqi institutions which are truly representative, legitimate and fully responsible."
He said such a conference would be modelled on similar talks held in Bonn in November 2001 under UN auspices to set up the transition government in Afghanistan.
Chirac also lashed out at Israel's unilateral plan to reshape its borders by withdrawing from the Gaza Strip but keeping some West Bank settlements, saying it was "dangerous" and calling for international law to be respected.
The plan - which was given public backing Wednesday by US President George W. Bush and would allow Israel to keep lands captured in the 1967 war and bar Palestinians refugees from returning to their homes - would set "a troubling precedent," he said.
"I don't believe that peace can be imposed, especially when it concerns two adversaries who have been seriously fighting for such a long time."
France plays a significant part in the so-called quartet made up of the European Union, Russia, the United Nations and the United States which is trying to find a solution to the long-running Middle East conflict.
Chirac was in Algiers to congratulate Bouteflika just a week after the Algerian president won re-election in a landslide.
His visit so soon after Bouteflika's re-election victory with 85 percent of the vote took the Algerian media by surprise, with some newspapers questioning his motives.
El Watan saw the visit as an endorsement of the polls - bitterly disputed by top challenger Ali Benflis - while Le Quotidien d'Oran believed the "rush" to be seen in Algiers betrayed France's wish to counter "the growing influence of the Americans".
Chirac last week was among the first to send a message of congratulations to Bouteflika, promising France's support for future economic and social reforms.
France ruled Algeria for 132 years before granting it independence in 1962 following a guerrilla war lasting nearly eight years that claimed an estimated 100,000 French and one million Algerian lives.
The two countries now maintain close relations, and a significant number of France's estimated five million Muslim population come from Algeria.
Chirac's spokeswoman, Catherine Colonna, said Wednesday: "This trip shows the new path of Franco-Algerian relations since 2003, relations that both countries want to be close, trusting and smooth."
She added: "There is no doubt that a new chapter in Franco-Algerian relations started last year."
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