FRANCE24 — broadcast
20260807 123000 UTC
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[00:00:00] the Islamic State hidden in Bossaso has agreed to
[00:00:03] testify, but to remain discreet, he cannot
[00:00:06] be seen with us. We spoke on the phone, his
[00:00:09] words are
[00:00:11] repeated,
[00:00:14] "I'm hiding, I'm afraid he'll find me and kill me because I
[00:00:18] dared to run away.
[00:00:21] I can't go home because if the police find me, they'll
[00:00:24] arrest me."
[00:00:30] Arriving in Bossaso after several days on the road, I had come
[00:00:32] from Ethiopia.
[00:00:36] I was looking for work and apparently to find it in this
[00:00:38] country,
[00:00:41] I went to a mosque every Friday and after
[00:00:45] several weeks, a Yemeni came to see me to ask if I
[00:00:48] wanted to join an organization to defend a strong
[00:00:52] Islam. This man entrusted me with
[00:00:56] packages to take to different neighborhoods. I wasn't allowed to open them.
[00:01:00] but I knew very well what was inside, it was weapons.
[00:01:03] Then one day I was told that I had to leave Bossaso, that I was going
[00:01:07] to the mountains, and that's when I really understood who I was
[00:01:10] dealing with. This man was from the Islamic
[00:01:12] State.
[00:01:17] There were many foreigners, there were Syrians, Turks,
[00:01:20] Moroccans. They gave me a weapon and taught me how to use it.
[00:01:24] Several times I had to shoot at soldiers.
[00:01:27] One day one of the leaders selected me, he said:
[00:01:30] "You're going to drive a car and you're going to have to blow it up at an army
[00:01:33] checkpoint." That's when I understood that I couldn't
[00:01:36] stay anymore, and I managed to escape.
[00:01:38] Today, do you still believe in the Islamic
[00:01:42] State program? I don't
[00:01:45] know.
[00:01:51] Its presence in Somalia is a ticking
[00:01:53] time bomb.
[00:01:55] It's impossible to know if it won't take up
[00:01:58] arms again one day." Like him, many recruits are
[00:02:01] foreign,
[00:02:04] so the police are now investigating all migrants.
[00:02:18] for the intellectual autonomy of the
[00:02:25] the place where it was said, where you come
[00:02:27] from.
[00:02:53] freedom and institutional
[00:03:30] These are people we don't see, who
[00:03:32] its allies, from hide and ruin our
[00:03:33] lives.
[00:03:41] His last catch happened thanks to an error by the terrorists.
[00:03:46] will attack with them one of the last ISIS
[00:03:54] Crimea by
[00:04:03] In their home, here, there was a hole due to
[00:04:05] fighters, the the explosion of one of the bombs they were preparing, they lived there
[00:04:08] with their families, their furniture, their belongings, they also prepared
[00:04:12] their explosives there.
[00:04:21] example, a conference by the
[00:04:24] there are funds that totally escape state control.
[00:04:26] In Somalia, telecommunications
[00:04:30] companies are private and they have their own
[00:04:34] relations, but it is true that we regulations, especially concerning money
[00:04:36] transfers, there is
[00:04:38] military eliminated 25 members of no limit on the amount, they can send 2 or 3 million dollars
[00:04:42] in one go, no one controls these transactions, and
[00:04:46] that's what they exploit here, if there was no easy money to manage, they
[00:04:49] wouldn't invest in this
[00:04:51] not mean the end of country.
[00:04:54] According to local authorities, the Somali faction supplies the
[00:04:58] different branches of ISIS around the world.
[00:05:02] It has gained considerable importance in a few
[00:05:04] years.
[00:05:08] We're going to take a tour of the Bossaso checkpoint, it's a barrier
[00:05:11] outside the city, on the road that goes towards the capital Mogadishu.
[00:05:37] We are looking for ammunition, explosives leaving the
[00:05:41] city.
[00:06:04] We have found many things passing through there, transported in large
[00:06:07] trucks, hidden in fruits and
[00:06:10] vegetables.
[00:07:23] Other bombs could be hidden, but the soldiers must still
[00:07:26] use this
[00:07:27] track.
[00:07:32] That day, the officers are summoned to a nearby
[00:07:35] village.
[00:08:13] that our people have been
[00:08:14] hurt.
[00:08:21] When you eliminate members of Daesh, they reappear elsewhere, it's a virus.
[00:08:25] They can spread in Africa, in Asia, in
[00:08:28] Europe, America,
[00:08:31] everywhere. We must
[00:08:34] fight them all. We need air support,
[00:08:38] transport means, we need weapons,
[00:08:42] we need equipment for our demining teams. We tell the world
[00:08:45] to remain careful about them, we must help all those for whom they are a problem and us
[00:08:49] here too. The minister informed them of a new
[00:08:53] phase of the offensive, in a few days American commandos
[00:08:58] bases. How are you? Did you prepare
[00:09:02] dinner? Potatoes, they make
[00:09:05] us strong, it's good food,
[00:09:08] rich in protein. The mountain
[00:09:12] diet, Ali and his team are waiting for their food, they are freedom
[00:09:18] men who liberate the country.
[00:09:21] We've been here for a year, we
[00:09:27] are convinced that this is our land, that we have
[00:09:31] liberated it and that we will never leave it.
[00:09:34] Some have died, some have been injured, but for those who remain, we
[00:09:38] are ready to die and be injured for this...
[00:09:42] We are ready.
[00:09:44] A few
[00:09:47] days later, the
[00:09:51] the Islamic State during the joint operation with the
[00:09:54] Americans.
[00:09:57] The noose is tightening on Daesh in Somalia, but a military
[00:10:00] victory will the
[00:10:03] threat.
[00:10:28] It hurts me a lot that no one can even directly call Julia my
[00:10:31] partner, only. Julia and
[00:10:34] Natalia are engaged but cannot get
[00:10:36] married.
[00:10:40] Poland is one of the last European countries not to have legalized either marriage or civil unions of the same
[00:10:43] sex. Only homosexual marriages concluded abroad are administratively
[00:10:46] recognized.
[00:10:49] for several years and now we can say that we have support from family and
[00:10:52] loved ones.
[00:10:57] As you know, we are engaged and I proposed to
[00:11:00] Natalia, so I prepared a beautiful trip to Norway, which
[00:11:04] was a surprise, everything was wonderful, there were waves, there was a lighthouse,
[00:11:07] we were alone, the weather was beautiful, it was a beautiful
[00:11:11] winter, it was wonderful, I swear, can you imagine
[00:11:14] an engagement, that's it, and I normally set up the phone,
[00:11:18] we're recording, we're rushing, and then when she started recording, I was completely
[00:11:22] like, we have this recording and my heart was
[00:11:26] pounding, because I was convinced that this was the moment, well, I was full of dread,
[00:11:29] because I had left the ring in Gdansk, so
[00:11:33] I knew that nothing would happen in it, I was simply recording beautiful shots,
[00:11:36] eventually it happened when we had already landed in Gdansk,
[00:11:39] my friends were there and we got engaged at
[00:11:42] Neptune.
[00:11:47] Since we got engaged in Norway, we would really
[00:11:51] like to have the wedding in Norway, although
[00:11:54] it is known full marital equality in
[00:11:58] Poland, recently the Sejm adopted a law on the status of a close person
[00:12:02] and it is known, if it passes further, we will certainly
[00:12:06] use it and here I do not hide the fact that
[00:12:09] then we will use such legal frameworks and such legal solutions as
[00:12:13] we can, however, this is not a satisfactory
[00:12:15] law for us, it hurts me a lot that no one can even directly
[00:12:19] call Julia my partner, only a
[00:12:22] close person, wife, wife. Well, that's
[00:12:25] actually some level of
[00:12:40] same-sex relationship, but is afraid. I would say that now, despite all these difficult
[00:12:42] comments and often strange glances,
[00:12:46] unpleasant situations, or the fact that some people think that
[00:12:50] I am not human, that I am a perversion, ultimately.
[00:12:53] I return to a home where I feel safe, that is more valuable to me than anything anyone could say to us,
[00:13:00] Hello and welcome to Face to Face on France
[00:13:20] 24. Our guest this week is Louis Vassi, he is the director of the Institute
[00:13:24] of Political Studies of Paris, known as Sciences Po. He
[00:13:27] has been director since October 2024. Thank you very much for being here.
[00:13:31] You are a former ambassador to the Netherlands, former chief of staff at the
[00:13:34] Ministry of Foreign Affairs. As a diplomat and as the
[00:13:38] director of an institute that prepares future
[00:13:42] ambassadors, one thing now seems clear: the multipolar
[00:13:45] world has had its day and Donald Trump is perhaps not
[00:13:48] an accident of history but perhaps an indicator of what
[00:13:52] is happening. Emmanuel Macron spoke
[00:13:56] of the carnivores, the United States, China, Russia, even
[00:14:00] India, who are there and Europe doesn't really
[00:14:02] know what to do, it has really changed its tune. Yes, I think everyone
[00:14:06] has understood that we have changed our tune, and to be honest, it has changed its tune for
[00:14:10] a long time. Is it in 2001, is it in
[00:14:13] 2004, in 2008 with the financial crisis, is it in
[00:14:16] 2014 with the invasion of
[00:14:19] Russia? Of course, it has changed
[00:14:22] its period and basically... uh it's true that it's something I
[00:14:26] observed firsthand in my previous diplomatic
[00:14:29] functions when I started at the Ministry of Foreign Affairs
[00:14:32] in 2004 it was still a world where multilateral texts were negotiated where
[00:14:35] we believed in the ability
[00:14:38] to collectively govern the
[00:14:41] world through cooperation even if wars existed, tensions existed and
[00:14:45] and this way of doing things has eroded over the
[00:14:49] years and today we see that that power essentially
[00:14:53] expresses itself more. It has always been structuring in international
[00:14:59] believed in the 90s, at the beginning of the 2000s that we had entered a different
[00:15:02] era, and essentially we are finally returning to what the
[00:15:06] world is, that is to say
[00:15:09] a scene very organized by power dynamics. Does
[00:15:13] Europe not suffer all
[00:15:16] this, does it have a little bit the impression that Europe, which was built to no longer wage
[00:15:20] war, doesn't really know what to do while war has returned
[00:15:24] to its soil and perhaps to our borders? That
[00:15:27] is a fact, I don't think we should regret it, Europe
[00:15:31] completely, it just needs to be lucid, but Europe turned its
[00:15:34] back or wanted to turn its back
[00:15:37] on centuries of permanent civil wars. Europe was in a
[00:15:41] state of almost continuous war for
[00:15:44] 5, 6 centuries until 1945 and obviously with
[00:15:47] the immeasurable tragedies of the 20th
[00:15:50] century, it wanted to turn its back through
[00:15:53] regional integration, continental integration on this
[00:15:57] reality. The difficulty, I think, that it is
[00:16:00] facing is that Europe is an empire like the United States
[00:16:04] or China, but a different empire where...
[00:16:07] the other great powers project their imperial power outwards,
[00:16:11] Europe is more like the Holy Roman Empire, it tries
[00:16:15] rather to manage
[00:16:18] conflicts between its parties in a certain way, and I believe everyone
[00:16:22] understands now that it must also be capable of projecting power
[00:16:25] at least to protect itself, and Europeans have
[00:16:29] become aware of this, many say it, seek to
[00:16:31] become stronger too, there are the reports produced by Mr. Letta,
[00:16:35] by Mr. Draghi, this questioning is...
[00:16:37] present, but it is true that we come from a history that is one of divisions
[00:16:41] to which we are trying to turn our backs and this is not totally absurd,
[00:16:44] let's say. So this geopolitical climate and especially
[00:16:48] what is happening in the United States, in American universities,
[00:16:52] saw the battles between the Trump administration, the great
[00:16:55] universities, Harvard, Columbia and others,
[00:16:58] has a concrete impact at Sciences
[00:17:01] Po, we see a very notable arrival
[00:17:05] of American students, even of American university professors
[00:17:08] at Sciences Po and in other European
[00:17:12] universities, and on the other hand, a clear
[00:17:15] desire of students not to go to the
[00:17:18] United States anymore. Yes, well, that's perhaps a
[00:17:21] bit excessive as a presentation, but it's true that there's a reconfiguration of international
[00:17:25] student flows, it's a reality. The New
[00:17:29] York Times, when it talked about Sciences Po a few weeks ago, described us as a
[00:17:33] refuge, and it's true that at
[00:17:36] a time when, basically, these international
[00:17:40] fractures are occurring, many students are trying to figure out
[00:17:43] where it's good to go, especially since a study project is a project for
[00:17:47] 4, 5, 6 years sometimes, and so you need to have some certainty about how it's
[00:17:51] going to go. What we offer at Sciences Po, and I
[00:17:55] think more broadly in Europe, but it's true that we are very well placed due to our
[00:17:58] internationalization over the past 25 years, is in fact an
[00:18:02] atmosphere of freedom, and basically, the university
[00:18:05] is above all else... freedom of expression, academic
[00:18:09] freedom, freedom to debate, freedom to have different points of view, and then
[00:18:13] obviously, the fact of doing it in an atmosphere of intellectual
[00:18:16] excellence. This has a very clear consequence for
[00:18:20] us, as you said, a very notable increase in the number of foreign
[00:18:23] applications, plus 33% in the first year, and if we look specifically at American
[00:18:27] students, it's plus 50% for first-year
[00:18:31] applications. If we take all our programs combined, for the first time in our
[00:18:34] history, we have exceeded 100 American applications. To give you an idea,
[00:18:38] that's twice as many as the second nationality, which is Germany, a little over
[00:18:41] 500. So yes, there's a very large flow of American
[00:18:44] students to Sciences Po, but in fact of students from all over the
[00:18:48] world, and especially from Southern countries. But
[00:18:51] on the other hand, as I said, there are also fewer French or European
[00:18:55] students who want to go to the United States, and we can still
[00:18:59] think that the political climate in general, and particularly on campuses,
[00:19:03] doesn't really make them want to go there, whereas it was traditionally seen as the
[00:19:06] Holy Grail. That can play a role. It's true that in a few months, the
[00:19:10] United States went from being the most sought-after destination by our students for
[00:19:13] their year abroad. You know that at Sciences Po, all students spend their
[00:19:17] third year studying abroad, it's very specific. I think we are the only
[00:19:20] university in the world to operate in this way. And so we observe what the
[00:19:24] demands are, and it's true that the United States has fallen back a lot, by 50% in
[00:19:28] fact, and Asia, on the other hand, is increasing
[00:19:32] enormously, not just China, by the way, it's also Southeast Asia, Japan,
[00:19:35] Korea, which are attracting a lot of our
[00:19:37] students. So, when you arrived at Sciences Po
[00:19:41] almost two years ago, it must be said, the school was
[00:19:44] in crisis, already at the level of its leadership, but also because
[00:19:48] of the demonstrations most often linked to the war in Gaza. You
[00:19:52] had taken precautionary measures against students, you called
[00:19:56] on law enforcement, you banned, for
[00:19:59] far-left Euro-MP Rima Hassan, and
[00:20:02] you stated that calm had returned, but it remains
[00:20:06] tense. In April, there were again incidents, the
[00:20:10] police were called. The
[00:20:12] majority of the faculty professors denounced your
[00:20:16] use of the police, a repression, unilateral
[00:20:19] governance. What is your response to these criticisms
[00:20:23] of your operating mode since your
[00:20:26] arrival? I think that basically what we need is above all to have
[00:20:29] substantive debates, and that's basically the most interesting thing in a university. The substantive
[00:20:33] debate we're talking about here is how we define freedom of
[00:20:36] expression. My point of view is that freedom of expression is
[00:20:39] total at Sciences Po, and in fact anyone who comes
[00:20:43] here walks around the campus to note that it's
[00:20:47] unique. There are 2,800 events per year
[00:20:51] at Sciences Po, the vast majority of which are organized by students, and many
[00:20:54] are on difficult political topics. There is absolutely no
[00:20:57] stifling of debate, we can talk about geopolitics, we can talk about the Middle East
[00:21:01] obviously at Sciences Po, and we can hold even frankly radical
[00:21:04] positions. What we cannot do obviously is block the institution because
[00:21:08] by definition, for this freedom of expression to exist, the
[00:21:11] spaces must be available to everyone,
[00:21:15] otherwise it's a capture, if you will, by some of the spaces at the expense of
[00:21:18] others, and I am the guarantor ultimately
[00:21:22] of this possibility for everyone to express themselves. Freedom of
[00:21:24] expression, there are those who like it except that of others, if you will, they
[00:21:28] like their freedom of expression but not that of others. I am the somewhat
[00:21:32] neutral guarantor of the freedom of expression of everyone, and by definition that means
[00:21:36] that the spaces must remain open to everyone. Now, I wouldn't say that
[00:21:40] honestly it's the normal operating mode at Sciences Po.
[00:21:43] There was indeed on April 14th this
[00:21:46] event, it was the first time in a year and I hope that... it
[00:21:50] will remain, if possible, I would like that to not happen again because
[00:21:53] indeed, it's never pleasant to have to
[00:21:56] react, but on the other hand, it's still
[00:22:00] extremely sporadic. The atmosphere on campus is objectively
[00:22:03] excellent and I hope that will last because it's
[00:22:07] also good for students to have this flourishing, if you will, of
[00:22:11] ideas and debates. So more broadly,
[00:22:13] how do we preserve both academic
[00:22:16] freedom and freedom of expression in institutions
[00:22:20] like yours? To talk about the United States again, we saw
[00:22:23] the Trump administration accuse Columbia
[00:22:27] University of antisemitism, pushing
[00:22:30] it, including with a kind of financial blackmail, to
[00:22:34] make reforms. Could that also happen
[00:22:38] in France and for Sciences Po, which
[00:22:41] also depends on public authorities?
[00:22:44] Well, I think that's a fascinating question, and it's true
[00:22:47] that traditionally in France there are
[00:22:51] many people who know universities
[00:22:53] who actually support a system entirely
[00:22:57] financed by the state. I say be careful because in a
[00:23:01] way it is still a risk, including
[00:23:04] financial, but in fact above all
[00:23:08] university. So what I fundamentally believe is that autonomy,
[00:23:11] there are those who talk about freedom and those who organize it. I am
[00:23:15] more in the category of doers than talkers,
[00:23:19] let's say. And so what I'm trying to do is to reduce
[00:23:23] our dependencies as quickly as possible and as much as possible to anyone,
[00:23:26] and so it's true that I'm working on an economic
[00:23:30] model that reduces our dependence on public
[00:23:33] funds, first because the budgetary situation of France being what
[00:23:36] it is, I think it's reasonable financially, but also because I believe that behind it is a question of
[00:23:40] intellectual
[00:23:43] autonomy. So today, for the first time, we have fallen
[00:23:47] below 30% of our budget coming from the state, we are at 29
[00:23:50] %, and I intend to quickly reach 25 and then
[00:23:54] continue to develop our autonomization because
[00:23:57] political power, as happened in the United States, has changed and it could
[00:24:01] also change in France and that could become more complicated, but I don't
[00:24:05] rely on hypotheses, on maybes
[00:24:08] and so on, but what I mean is a bit like international relations, you
[00:24:11] see your dependencies,
[00:24:14] it's the day you have a problem that you realize them, you see
[00:24:17] the American administration cut off the whole world, including
[00:24:22] access to the latest developments in
[00:24:26] finally LLM of Anthropic.
[00:24:29] Up until then, we didn't really see the problems of dependence, and so that's the
[00:24:32] problem of letting these dependencies occur, it's that you
[00:24:36] only realize their problematic
[00:24:39] nature on the day there's a crisis. So if we
[00:24:42] want, I think the intelligent thing to do is to anticipate
[00:24:46] and rather de-risk, as they say, and try to be less dependent. We
[00:24:50] never know what the future holds, and in any case, we clearly
[00:24:54] see that the budgetary situation in France being what it is, it's reasonable for Sciences Po
[00:24:58] to depend less on public funds, and that's a way
[00:25:01] of being financially reasonable and intellectually
[00:25:04] autonomous. Louis, thank you very much for answering the questions of
[00:25:08] France 24, and thank you for watching this
[00:25:11] program on our channels.
[00:25:13] Thank you.
[00:25:24] Welcome to all of you, with Judith, personalities
[00:25:27] revisit their destiny, that moment when their life changed. I was not
[00:25:31] destined to become the Green candidate in
[00:25:35] every election that came up. I never
[00:25:37] had this fantasy, this dream of going behind the camera. The
[00:25:41] Me Too movement, the liberation of speech is an extraordinary
[00:25:45] movement, it is a cultural revolution. We
[00:25:47] bought millions of masks. But the next crisis might not be a
[00:25:51] respiratory
[00:25:52] virus.
[00:25:57] with Judith exclusively on the France 24 YouTube channel
[00:26:00] and all podcast platforms.
[00:26:05] Watch the weather with Tramier, an extra virgin
[00:26:08] olive oil without pesticide residues to take care of
[00:26:12] yourself and your loved ones. Tramier, transmit the
[00:26:15] true taste.
[00:30:07] 24, thank you for choosing our channels to keep informed, here are the headlines of this
[00:30:11] news: several people killed by gunfire in Thailand, the
[00:30:14] young man responsible for this shooting was 14 years old, he had
[00:30:18] clearly planned his attack according to the Prime Minister, before
[00:30:22] opening fire in his high school, the young man first killed
[00:30:25] his own grandparents.
[00:30:28] We will also
[00:30:31] stop in this news on this defense agreement signed by
[00:30:35] Pakistan, Turkey, Saudi Arabia, while the war between the United States and
[00:30:38] Iran is redrawing the balances in the region. What commitments have been
[00:30:42] made, what does this pact contain? The analysis of Mélina Uet to
[00:30:46] follow in this edition.
[00:30:49] And then in Colombia, the inauguration this evening of the far-right president elected last
[00:30:53] June, Abelardo de la Espriella says he is determined to
[00:30:56] fight the guerrillas and drug trafficking.