French Foreign Minister Bernard Kouchner has confirmed a Paris newspaper report that France has opened political contacts with the Hamas terrorist organization. "These are not relations, but contacts. We must be able to talk to each other," he told Europe 1 radio.

The first contact between France and Gaza was made between senior French diplomat Yves Aubin de La Messuziere and Hamas leaders Ismail Haniyeh and Mahmoud Al Zahar. La Messuziere told the Le Figaro newspaper that Hamas was prepared to accept a new Arab state based on the 1949 Armistice Lines, "which was equivalent to an indirect recognition of Israel." He also declared that Hamas is willing to accept the authority of rival Fatah party leader Mahmoud Abbas and to stop terrorist attacks against Israel.