Former French Environment Minister Nicolas Hulot on Thursday greeted the memory of President Jacques Chirac, highlighting the "ecological sensitivity" of the one who was, according to him, one of the first "artisans" of international environmental consciousness .
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Nicolas Hulot said he experienced "a very deep sadness," explaining that he had "with President Chirac a relationship very old, very complicit, very affectionate". "We did not always have the same political ideas but it never changed our friendship," he said. "And then I remember, and I'm not the only one, that it was thanks to the listening he gave me on many occasions that his ecological sensitivity awakened, emerged and led to this Johannesburg speech which was a first milestone to which we are referring today, "he pointed out.
"Our house burns and we look elsewhere"
Nicolas Hulot refers to the warning issued by President Jacques Chirac in September 2002, at a summit of the Earth, in Johannesburg: "Our house burns and we look elsewhere." This speech was, for Nicolas Hulot, "a true word, a hard word, a raw word on this house that burns and that we do not look at". "Beyond the high-profile summit in Johannesburg, there have been many forums in which he has continued to mobilize and all this has probably contributed to the beginning of an international awareness and I think he was one of the artisans, "concluded the former minister.
The former TV presenter also recalled that one of the last diplomatic actions of Jacques Chirac was "a summit of Paris around the idea of a world organization of the Environment". This project has so far not succeeded, but "the story will one day remember that one of the first who had brought this idea was President Chirac," noted Nicolas Hulot.