The newly elected Australian Prime Minister Anthony Albanese announced, on Saturday morning (11), still Friday night in Brazil, that the country has reached an agreement with the French shipyard Naval Group because of the breach, in September, of a contract billionaire for building nuclear-powered submarines.
At the time, Canberra buried the purchase with Paris, initially agreed in 2016, after signing a military pact with the United States and the United Kingdom for the development of these vessels. Now, the country has agreed a payment of US$ 583 million as a form of compensation.
“It’s a fair and equitable deal,” Albanese told a news conference. According to him, Emmanuel Macron – who has also been through elections recently – participated in the talks that culminated in the agreement. The Australian thanked the French leader for the cordial way in which relations between the two countries are being re-established.
At the time of the announcement of the pact with the Americans and the British, which became known by the brand Aukus, a diplomatic crisis was triggered, with Paris calling the ambassadors in Washington and Canberra for consultations. In diplomatic jargon, the move means strong dissatisfaction with the country that houses the diplomats.
Then-French Chancellor Jean-Yves Le Drian called the move a “stab in the back” and said Joe Biden resembled his predecessor Donald Trump in making a “one-sided, brutal and unpredictable” decision.
