French Foreign Minister Bernard Kouchner’s so-called radical and progressive roots — he was a Communist Party member in his youth and started Doctors Without Borders — is often brought up as evidence that he is his own man in Nicolas Sarkozy’s otherwise right-wing government and will bring some conscience to French foreign policy and the way the major powers conduct their business. But as an approving profile in this past Sunday’s New York Times Magazine by James Traub confirms, Kouchner has changed a lot: he is now fiercely pro-American (and a darling of the neocons). He also comes off as (he may perhaps also feed that perception) as a sort of Pierra de Brazza figure.
Read the profile here.
For a less glowing assessment of Kouchner’s politics, see Diane Johnstone’s piece in Counterpunch or a BBC profile from last year.
