PARIS (Reuters) -- France has cancelled a meeting between Armed Forces Minister Florence Parly and her British counterpart planned for this week after Australia scrapped a submarine order with Paris in favor of a deal with Washington and London, two sources familiar with the matter said.
Parly personally took the decision to drop the bilateral meeting with British Defense Secretary Ben Wallace, the sources said.
The French defense ministry could not be immediately reached. The British defense ministry declined comment.
The sources confirmed an earlier report in the Guardian newspaper that the meeting had been cancelled.
The scrapping of the multi-billion-dollar submarine contract, struck in 2016, has triggered a diplomatic crisis, with Paris recalling its ambassadors from Washington and Canberra.
France claims not to have been consulted by its allies, while Australia says it had made clear to Paris for months its concerns over the contract.
French President Emmanuel Macron and U.S. President Joe Biden will speak by telephone in the coming days to discuss the crisis, the French government’s spokesman said on Sunday.
Australian Prime Minister Scott Morrison on Monday departed for Washington to meet with leaders of the Quad grouping amid criticism over his government’s decision to abandon the $40 billion submarine deal with France.
France has said the relationship with Australia and the United States is in “crisis” and has recalled its ambassadors from both countries.
While Australia has moved to dampen tensions, expressing its regret over the incident, Morrison’s meeting with fellow Quad leaders British Prime Minister Boris Johnson and U.S. President Joe Biden threatens to inflame French irritation.
“The French are very unimpressed and the sight of Morrison, Biden and Johnson together will do little to repair ties,” said Haydon Manning, a political science professor at Flinders University in South Australia.
Japanese Prime Minister Yoshihide Suga will also attend the leaders’ meeting of the Quad group later this week.
“This is all about ensuring that Australia’s sovereign interests will be put first to ensure that Australians here can live peacefully with the many others in our region,” Morrison told reporters in Sydney as he boarded the plane to Washington.
New agreements furthering cooperation between the four countries are expected, but Australia will not announce strengthened climate targets sought by the United States, one senior government source said.