French President Emmanuel Macron will visit the Foreign Ministry on Thursday to discuss his policies with regards to new global challenges, and to meet French diplomats who have expressed their dissatisfaction with his controversial reform of the senior civil service.
The president is expected to outline "his desire to rearm diplomacy to face the challenges", in particular from the geopolitical upheavals prompted by the war in Ukraine, an adviser told journalists, as cited by AFP news agency.
Macron will also address the "need for adaptation", to take into account new themes such as food security, energy issues, climate and biodiversity.
While paying tribute to the diplomatic corps, the president is also expected to ask his foreign affairs staff to "innovate" and "versatile", and to be "capable of deploying on all fronts".
The event marks the end of a six-month consultation on the evolution of French diplomacy, launched by the presidency last September.
The result is a 300-page report, based on the collaboration of more than 5,000 agents who participated in meetings, working groups and responded to a questionnaire, the ministry said.
Concern
Macron's visit comes against a backdrop of discontent at the ministry over proposed changes and budget concerns.
The reform of the senior civil service would see the phasing out of two historical pillars of French diplomacy - plenipotentiary ambassadors and foreign affairs advisers - by the end of 2023, and the creation of a new state corps.
Senior civil servants face being shifted around, and will no longer be attached to a specific administration for the duration of a career.
The announcement led to an extremely rare strike at the Quai d'Orsay last June over concerns about loss of skills and prestige of what is the world's third largest diplomatic network, behind the United States and China.
Fifty percent of French diplomatic posts have been cut over the past 30, years following decades of what some officials have called the "marginalisation" of the role of the ministry within the state.
According to official figures, the Foreign Ministry employs 13,500 people. The reforms would affect 700 diplomatic staff.
"The president is attentive to the arguments" and the "needs" of the agents, Elysée staff said.
Macron's entourage invoked a "very high level of support" for the reform, stating, without further details, that "60 percent of the agents concerned" had already "expressed the wish to switch" to the new body of state administrators.
(With AFP)
