Wow. Just … wow. Nicolas Sarkozy is indeed very different from Jacques Chirac — he’s even worse. He’s made a nuclear deal with Libya, and apparently intends to do the same with other Arab countries. Sarkozy: Trust Arabs with nukes.

Now we know the price for freeing those foreign medics: a nuclear reactor.

TRIPOLI, Libya (Reuters) — After agreeing to nuclear cooperation with Libya, French President Nicolas Sarkozy said the West should trust Arab states to develop such technology for peaceful purposes or risk a war of civilizations.

Sarkozy said preventing Arab states from developing nuclear power risked stoking a “war of civilizations.”

France agreed on Wednesday to help Libya develop a nuclear reactor to supply drinking water from desalinated sea water. The reactor might be supplied by French atomic energy firm Areva. Sarkozy told reporters in Libya that to consider the Arab world “is not sensible enough to use civilian nuclear power” would, in the long run, risk a “war of civilizations”.

“Nuclear power is the energy of the future,” he said. “If we don’t give the energy of the future to the countries of the southern Mediterranean, how will they develop themselves? And if they don’t develop, how will we fight terrorism and fanaticism?”

In what universe does it make sense to say, “We need to trust their peaceful intentions, or they’ll declare war on us?”