03/03/2004 (Agence Europe) - Le Monde of 3 March reports that, at the European Summit on 25 and 26 March, France and Germany are to propose a Strategic Partnership for a common future with the Middle East which will be complementary to the American initiative for the Greater Middle East to be presented at the G-8 Summit from 8 to 10 June at Sea Island, Florida (see yesterday's EUROPE, page 4, and 10 February, p.5, on the subject of ideas launched in Munich by Joschka Fischer). The document will stress that "any initiative for the Middle East must meet the region's needs and aspirations" and that the EU must "define a separate approach that completes that of the United States". It recalls that all States and societies concerned collectively expressed strong objection of any attempt to impose an external "model" on them. On 3 March, Italian Foreign Minister Franco Frattini presented the NATO Council with Italy's ideas on strengthening the Alliance's Mediterranean Dialogue with a view to the Atlantic Summit on 28 and 29 June in Istanbul. (See next article also on Javier Solana's visit to Cairo).