France still bristling over Indo-Pacific sub snub

BY MATTHEW LEE
AP Diplomatic Writer

NEW YORK (AP) — This week’s phone call between President Joe Biden and French President Emmanuel Macron may have soothed some the incandescent rage with which France erupted over its exclusion from a new Indo-Pacific defense initiative, but the anger and resentment remain clear. After meeting Thursday with Secretary of State Antony Blinken on the sidelines of the UN General Assembly, the French foreign minister pointedly referred to the situation as a “crisis” that will take time and U.S. action to overcome. That’s even after Macron agreed to send his country’s ambassador back to Washington. The ambassador had been recalled to Paris in an unprecedented move at the height of the spat.