AXA CEO Tells AAPA: Climate Change, healthcare Costs are Top Priorities
AXA CEO Thomas Buberl invited the AAPA to lunch at the company's headquarters around the corner from the Elysee Palace on January 10 for a broad on-the-record discussion dominated by the themes of instability and…
Air France-KLM boss Ben Smith talks planes, unions and greenhouse gas with the AAPA
Long lunches, long holidays, and myriad trades unions were all part of the steep learning curve facing Canadian Ben Smith when he took the helm of Air France-KLM in 2018, the affable 48-year-old told the Anglo-American Press Association. And he had to work hard on his French, he said during a wide-ranging discussion held in the offices of Bloomberg near the Paris Opera on Friday 17 January, as a…
Macron's diplomatic advisor outlines presidential foreign policy
NATO, Trump, Brexit, Russia, trade, EU reform, European strategic sovereignty: Emmanuel Macron's diplomatic advisor provided AAPA members with insights on the French president's foreign policy thinking. The meeting on December 17 was an off-the-record briefing provided by Emmanuel Bonne on how the centrist president is seeking to position France as he enters the second half of his five-year…
Fashion's Commitment to Sustainability: Kering CSO Speaks to the AAPA
Kering's Chief Sustainability Officer and Head of International Institutional Affairs, Marie-Claire Daveu, hosted the AAPA at a morning coffee on December 3 at Kering's headquarters on the rue de Sèvres in a historic building that -- until 2000 -- housed the Laennec hospital. Kering was appointed by French president Emmanuel Macron to head the country's effort to make fashion more sustainable. It…
Muslim and Jewish «best friends » bring women together to fight anti-Semitism and racism
On November 12th The Anglo American Press Association had a meeting and conversation with Samia Essabaa and Suzanne Nakache, the Muslim and Jewish founders of Langage de Femmes, a multi-confessional, intergenerational group of women fighting racism and anti-Semitism in France. France has Europe’s largest Muslim and Jewish populations and hate crimes have grown in recent years. But Essabaa and…
Sibeth Ndiaye, the spokesperson for the French government, met with the Anglo-American Press Association on November 14th, 2019.
In a 90 minute group interview, Ndiaye discussed her attachment to France, her relationship with President Emmanuel Macron, how the crisis of the Gilets Jaunes has changed his policies, Franco-American relations, sectarianism in France, the reasons behind the strike scheduled for December 5th, pension reform, the accusation of rape against film director Roman Polanski, racism against herself,…
Shaking it up at the Châtelet
A rare chance to watch the final rehearsals for a musical at the Théâtre du Châtelet was the cherry on the cake for AAPA members who met with the theatre's new Artistic Director on November 26. Ruth Mackenzie is the first woman in the job, and first non-French national - she is British. She made it clear to our group that she is not at all daunted by the challenges either one of those factors…
Preparing for Brexit - the Irish Angle
With Brexit possibly going ahead on October 31, with or without a deal, the implications for Ireland are manifold and complicated. A high-ranking Irish diplomat sat down with AAPA members at the Irish Embassy for a background briefing on the latest progress in talks, the risks of a no-deal Brexit, the high stakes for Ireland, and some of the plans already in place to limit the chaos if Britain…
Women spies and how to write a best-seller
With an eye on D-Day stories and tips on how to write a best-selling novel, AAPA members had a wide-ranging exchange with Washington-based British novelist Jennifer Ryan. Ryan’s best-selling debut novel “The Chilbury Ladies’ Choir” was about women in World War II, and she continued the theme in her second novel, published in June 2019, “The Spies of Shilling Lane”. She shared stories of women…
Europe Minister de Montchalin tells AAPA that France’s Brexit red lines stand
One of the newest and youngest members of the French government met the Anglo-American Press Association in late June to talk about some of the most important issues facing France and Europe. Amélie de Montchalin was appointed Secretary of State for European Affairs only three months earlier, taking over from Nathalie Loiseau who had quit the government to lead President Emmanuel Macron’s party…