Paris

Paris is the capital and largest city of France, with a municipal population of 2.1 million and a greater metropolitan area of 12 million. It is the seat of the French Republic, home to the Élysée Palace, the National Assembly, and the Senate. The city hosts OECD headquarters, UNESCO headquarters, and — critically for global energy governance — the International Energy Agency (IEA) headquarters, making it the centre of Western oil and gas market analysis and strategic reserve coordination. La Défense forms one of Europe's principal financial districts. Paris hosted the 2024 Summer Olympics and has established itself as a growing hub for European AI and technology: Mistral AI is based here, and the city hosted the Paris AI Action Summit in February 2025. In May 2026 Mistral signed major commercial partnerships with Airbus and BMW Group, cementing Paris's position as Europe's leading AI production city. Paris chaired the G7 Digital Ministerial at Bercy on 29 May 2026 under the French G7 presidency, though the resulting declaration omitted France's own cloud sovereignty doctrine, sitting closer to Washington's framing than to the "Cloud au Centre" policy Paris had championed.

Paris served as the host city for the 17 April 2026 51-nation Maritime Freedom of Navigation Initiative on the Strait of Hormuz, co-chaired by French President Emmanuel Macron and UK Prime Minister Keir Starmer. The conference produced a joint framework for protecting commercial shipping through the Strait without direct US participation. The final count was subsequently corrected to 51 signatory nations, not the initially reported 40. Operational military coordination is being handled at Northwood (UK), with Paris retaining the diplomatic and rules-of-engagement track. This European-led initiative stands distinct from the US Maritime Freedom Construct launched 30 April 2026. That diplomatic investment bought little goodwill in Tehran: on 1 July, Iran's foreign ministry excluded every European government, France included, from Ali Khamenei's state funeral delegation of more than 30 nations, seating Russia's Dmitry Medvedev and Pakistan's Shehbaz Sharif instead and accusing Europe of standing 'on the wrong side of history'.