French unruffled by presidency row

President Jacques Chirac felt not the tiniest bit embarrassed about keeping the leaders of Europe up until 2:00 a.m.

The unseemly battle for the presidency of the European Central Bank may have dominated coverage elsewhere in Europe, but in France few suggested that French nationalism had marred the launching of the euro.

Mr Michel Field, the journalist who interviewed Mr Chirac live on French television for one hour last night, did not even mention the ECB presidency - "an anecdote", he called it - for the first 20 minutes of the broadcast. The on-air discussion of the dispute that dominated the Brussels Summit lasted only a few minutes.

Mr Chirac said he had nothing personal against Mr Wim Duisenberg, the new president of the ECB. But he harboured reservations about his candidacy because the president of the ECB had to be totally independent when he fixes interest rates.

"It is not normal that the central bankers decided among themselves, with no real co-ordination with the politicians, to name one of their own to the head of the Central Bank," Mr Chirac said.

His second reservation concerned France's position in Europe. "I considered that France, the second economic power in Europe, at the moment when Europe embarked on monetary union, had to be represented.... All of this led to difficult discussions, as always happens when it is a question of individuals."

Mr Chirac said he reacted as he did "because I consider that the French nation must have its share of responsibility and because others had the same feeling I did." He was happy that the summit had reached a solution whereby France will have the vice presidency for four years and the presidency for eight years "after Mr Duisenberg made it known that by his own will - naturally without anyone asking him; he's completely independent -- he decided to interrupt his mandate at the end of the transitory period."

The French President insisted that there had been no question of violating the Maastricht Treaty's provision for an eight-year term for the president of the ECB. He alluded repeatedly to the "voluntary" and "personal" reasons for Mr Duisenberg's truncated mandate.

"I rejoice because for several months France will even have the presidency and the vice presidency at the same time," he added. This was proof, he said, that France would not be dominated by the deutschmark as some French people feared. "There is now an institution in which France will have an eminent position, notably during the take-off phase," he added.

Alone among French politicians, the centre-right former Finance Minister Mr Alain Madelin denounced the French haggling in Brussels as "a farce". French stubbornness at Brussels may be the result of the French conviction that EMU was a French idea. The French statesmen Mr Robert Schuman, Mr Raymond Barre and Mr Jacques Delors have all been called "the father of the euro" here.