United Nations

French troops' initial clashes have shown that the desert fighters are better trained and equipped than France had expected before intervention.

President François Hollande has just become involved in a large-scale war in Mali. Already some 800 French troops are on the ground in the African country, with the number expected to increase to 2,500 in the coming days and weeks. Meanwhile French aircraft have been carrying out strikes across the country. President Hollande sent in the troops last Friday, January 11th, after Mali's interim president made an urgent plea for help as Islamic rebels headed towards the country's capital. However, argues Mediapart's editor François Bonnet, the intervention has taken place in an impromptu manner, with shifting objectives, an unclear timetable and after having deliberately ignored the complex processes of political negotiations. As a result, he says, France finds itself alone without its European allies in a country that has completely fallen apart.

UN Secretary General Ban Ki-moon says he hopes the intervention will help restore "Mali's constitutional order and territorial integrity".

Foreign Minister said France had long backed Palestinian ambitions for statehood and would vote yes "out of a concern for coherency".

French President Francois Hollande warned that any use of Syria's chemical weapons would be a legitimate justification for military intervention.

French President Francois Hollande told reporters that Ambassador Lamia Shakkour will be notified "today or tomorrow" that she must leave.

France has raised the prospect of military intervention in Syria, saying the UN should consider harsher measures if an international peace plan fails.