Antony Blinken, the US secretary of state, said France remained a “vital partner” in the Indo-Pacific region in a bid to calm the fury in Paris over America’s new naval security pact with Australia and the UK.
The agreement announced this week by Joe Biden, the US president, Boris Johnson, the UK prime minister, and Scott Morrison, the Australian prime minister, is seen as a landmark initiative to strengthen their defence co-operation in the face of a rising China.
But the deal faced a stinging backlash from France, whose own lucrative submarine contract and partnership with Australia was scrapped as a result of the new trilateral initiative.