ERBIL () - President Masoud Barzani received Emmanuel Mignot, the newly appointed French Consul General to Erbil, at his Pirmam residence on Thursday, opening a meeting that ranged from decades of Kurdish-French friendship to the more immediate question of the coalition forces' departure from Iraq.
President Barzani congratulated Mignot on assuming his post and wished him success in his new role. The president went on to recall several key milestones in the long relationship between the Kurdish and French peoples, describing the bond between the two nations as both friendly and enduring.
For his part, Mignot affirmed that this historic partnership would continue uninterrupted. He said he intended to build on the work of his predecessors, carrying forward efforts to deepen cooperation between France and the Kurdistan Region across a range of fields.
Beyond the ceremonial exchange, they turned to the wider regional picture, reviewing the latest developments and the current situation across the Middle East. They also discussed the state of relations between Erbil and Baghdad.
A central topic of the meeting was the ending of the coalition forces' mission in Iraq, which Barzani and Mignot examined and assessed together as part of their broader conversation on regional stability.
