December 24, 2020
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France has been in the Indo-Pacific longer than conventional wisdom cares to acknowledge. French territories in the area span 11.7 million square kilometers of the South Indian and Pacific oceans, giving the European power one of the world’s largest Exclusive Economic Zones (EEZs). This not only grants France naval and other economic advantages, these very parcels of land and sea allow France to potentially gain an outsized influence in the Indo-Pacific arena. Indeed, if France chooses to speak, it cannot be ignored.
Among France’s overseas territories are the Mayotte and La Réunion Islands, Scattered Island, the French Southern and Antarctic lands in the southern Indian Ocean, and New Caledonia, Wallis-and-Futuna, French Polynesia and Clipperton in the Pacific Ocean.