Francia - Inglese

World Briefing | Europe: France: Chirac Starts to Bow Out

[NYT - Europe]

President Jacques Chirac made his last major public appearance as he laid a wreath at the Arc de Triomphe in Paris to commemorate the Allied victory over the Nazis in 1945. Mr. Chirac, who steps down next Wednesday after 12 years in office, is to hold his last meeting with his ministers today. After a three-day vacation in the Mediterranean, Nicolas Sarkozy, France’s newly elected president, is to join Mr. Chirac at a ceremony tomorrow in Paris to commemorate the abolition of slavery. When Mr. Chirac, 74, moves out of the Élysée Palace next week, it will be to an apartment on the Left Bank opposite the Louvre. It is being lent to the Chiracs by the family of the former Lebanese prime minister Rafik Hariri, who was assassinated in Beirut in 2005. Mr. Chirac was a close friend of Mr. Hariri.