In a recent magazine interview in which she floated the possibility that her husband might run for a third term as French president next year, Bernadette Chirac said enticingly – “Have you seen what good shape he’s in. My husband’s not senile.”
Yet even this modest claim must be thrown into doubt by Mr Chirac’s efforts to celebrate his 74th birthday, by holding an intimate dinner with Vladimir Putin on the margins of a Nato summit in Latvia.
Where does one start? To invite any Russian president to dinner in one of the Baltic states is tactless. To invite this particular president at this particular moment is crass. To do so at a Nato summit, while pointedly not inviting the American president and the British prime minister, is extraordinary.
While the Americans and the British are clearly increasingly concerned about the direction of Putin’s Russia, Mr Chirac’s admiration for the Russian president only seems to grow. In September he awarded Mr Putin the Grand Cross of the Legion d’Honneur, the highest honour that France can bestow on a foreigner. Previous recipients have included Churchill and Queen Elizabeth II.
This blog covers a variety of topics from US foreign policy to European politics and the Middle East - and whatever else happens to be in the news or catch my attention. I joined the FT as chief foreign affairs commentator in 2006, after a 15-year career at The Economist which included stints as a correspondent in Brussels, Bangkok and Washington. I write a weekly column on foreign affairs, which appears in the paper on Tuesdays. Occasionally my FT colleagues contribute posts to this blog.
Geoff Dyer is the FT's China bureau chief. He has been a correspondent in Shanghai and in Brazil and has also covered the pharmaceuticals and biotechnology industries from London.
Roula Khalaf is the FT's Middle East editor. She has worked for the FT since 1995, first as North Africa correspondent, then Middle East correspondent and most recently as Middle East editor. Before joining the FT, she was a staff writer for Forbes magazine in New York. 
James Blitz is the FT's defence and diplomatic editor. He has been the FT's political editor, based in London, and Rome bureau chief. James is a former Moscow bureau chief for the Sunday Times.
Alan Beattie is the FT's world trade editor. He has previously been economics leader writer and spent two years in Washington DC as chief US economics correspondent. Before joining the FT, Alan was an economist at the Bank of England. 
Victor Mallet is the FT's Madrid correspondent. He is a former Asia editor of the FT, and, in more than 20 years at the organisation, has also worked in Africa, Europe and the Middle East. In 1990 he escaped from Kuwait after being one of the few foreign correspondents there when Iraq invaded. 
Stefan Wagstyl is the FT's eastern Europe editor, co-ordinating coverage of the region. He has also been the FT's bureau chief in Tokyo and New Delhi.
