Impitoyable, Carter se paye Tony Blair

Le Prix Nobel de la Paix Jimmy Carter est toujours on the road, infatigable et beaucoup plus efficace comme ex-président que comme président (1977-81). Son interview au Sunday Telegraph, aujourd’hui, fait un certain bruit.

Carter critique impitoyablement Tony Blair. Il le désigne comme le principal responsable de la guerre en Irak, à cause de la façon dont il a cédé à GW Bush. Son observation, qui n’est pas si mauvaise, revient à dire : “des deux, Blair, le plus raisonnable, aurait dû jouer son rôle de frein dans cette entreprise folle, et il ne l’a pas fait”.

On a rarement observéé une attaque si violente de la part de personnages de ce rang, au sein de la Grande Alliance anglo-américaine. Perfidement, le Telegraph, qui est plutôt conservateur, note que cette attaque mesure l’hostilité qui, aujourd’hui, sépare les démocrates américains du Labour britannique.

Quelques extraits d’anthologie :

« Tony Blair's lack of leadership and timid subservience to George W Bush lie behind the ongoing crisis in Iraq and the worldwide threat of terrorism, according to the former American president Jimmy Carter. “I have been surprised and extremely disappointed by Tony Blair's behaviour,” he told The Sunday Telegraph.

» “I think that more than any other person in the world the Prime Minister could have had a moderating influence on Washington — and he has not. I really thought that Tony Blair, who I know personally to some degree, would be a constraint on President Bush's policies towards Iraq.”

» In an exclusive interview, President Carter made it plain that he sees Mr Blair's lack of leadership as being a key factor in the present crisis in Iraq, which followed the 2003 invasion — a pre-emptive move he said he would never have considered himself as president.

(…)

»  “In many countries where I meet with leaders and private citizens there is an equating of American policy with Great Britain — with Great Britain obviously playing the lesser role. We now have a situation where America is so unpopular overseas that even in countries like Egypt and Jordan our approval ratings are less than five per cent. It's a shameful and pitiful state of affairs and I hold your British Prime Minister to be substantially responsible for being so compliant and subservient.”

» The outspoken attack by the former Democratic president shows the extent of the alienation between the Labour Party and its traditional Democrat allies in America. It will embarrass the Prime Minister on his return from his summer family holiday in Barbados and comes as Mr Blair prepares to make a defiant speech warning his party that it risks losing the next election if it does not unite behind him. »

Mis en ligne le 27 août 2006 à 11H50