The appointment of Bernard Kouchner as foreign minister of France calls for superlatives like "exceptional, incredible, original".

The appointment of Bernard Kouchner as foreign minister of France calls for superlatives like "exceptional, incredible, original." Nearing 70 now, Kouchner has led a full and rewarding life. A gastroenterologist by training, he was the moving spirit that set up Doctors without Borders, truly a life-saving organization. He has been a minister of health, and the U.N. civil administrator in Kosovo. He likes to say that he is on the side of the oppressed, and one reason for that is the fact that his grandparents were murdered in Auschwitz. For a long time Saddam Hussein was a particular bete noire of his, and Kouchner condemned France for arming and trading with such a killer. Siding with Bush against Chirac, he was almost alone in the French elite in backing American intervention in Iraq, and gloried in emphasizing that he was right. A Socialist, he campaigned for Segolene Royal in the recent presidential elections, and said harsh things about Nicolas Sarkozy. Sarkozy surprised everyone by picking him, but the Socialists surprised nobody by straightaway throwing him out of the party. More superlatives may soon be in order.