as president in 1981 and the naming of Michel Rocard as Prime Minister in 1988, the government launched a new project, (CFI), a package of programmes aimed at making programmes in French for foreign audiences, particularly in Africa, to be developed in parallel as a television channel. The First Gulf War of 1990, relayed across the world by CNN International in particular, revealed the power of international news channels and their role in the formation of opinion. A parliamentary minister, Philippe Séguin, wished to create a French-language equivalent. In 1996, after nineteen governmental reports in ten years, Prime Minister Alain Juppé asked Radio France Internationale president Jean-Paul Cluzel (who was also General Inspector of Finances) to create a French international news channel. Cluzel proposed in 1997 to group TV5, RFI, and CFI within a corporation entitled Téléfi. The UMP-led government decided to follow that recommendation but, with the return of the Socialist Party to government and the nomination of Hubert Védrine, the new Minister of Foreign Affairs, favoured the augmentation of existing outlets such as TV5, which started to produce its own programming, notably its news bulletins, which in turn created its own news team. Additionally with the creation of EuroNews in 1993 (with French-language commentary), the media presence of France overseas became more complex, more fragmented, and costlier, without being able to rely on a true round-the-clock international news channel. Relaunched project (2002–2003) In 2002, President Jacques Chirac relaunched the project to create a French international news channel: On 7 March, speaking in the French Senate in front of foreign delegates to France, and as part of his presidential campaign, Chirac said, "We must have the ambition of a big, round-the-clock news channel in French, equal to the BBC or CNN for the English-speaking world. It is essential for the influence of our country. For our expatriates, it would be a live and an immediate link to the mainland" After his reelection, the first reflections were engaged at the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, headed by Dominique de Villepin. Various technical options were examined at the time, in an unreleased report: The purchase of EuroNews by the French state Creation of an external channel, proposed by then-France Télévisions President Marc Tessier, approved by the previous government An international version of LCI, proposed by Groupe TF1, which asked for a state subvention for the service Strengthening TV5's news service, as suggested