( dpa )- Amid tension over Paris' plans to set up a new Mediterranean nations group, French President Nicolas Sarkozy used a speech in Hanover Tuesday to stress common ground with Germany.
Sarkozy was making a flying visit to Germany to help open the March 4-9 CeBIT computing trade fair, where France will this year hold "partner nation" status among the 77 countries exhibiting software and digital equipment.
"Our reforms to the French economy will be good for German industry," he told an audience that included many German computer- industry executives. "Our foreign policies are largely convergent."
Sarkozy did not refer to the diplomatic dispute with Berlin over his plans for a Mediterranean Union with with non-European-Union nations around the sea.
But Chancellor Angela Merkel, following him to the Hanover podium, warned that it was vital that Germany and France agree with one another so that they exercise their "shared responsibility" for European unity.
Earlier she had whispered and smiled at Sarkozy as they sat in the audience. The two leaders were set to dine later with aides in a government mansion in Hanover before Sarkozy returned to Paris.
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