French President Jacques Chirac and Malaysian Prime Minister Abdullah Ahmad Badawi on Thursday pledged to work together to promote sustainable development and stamp out global poverty, Chirac's office said.

The visiting Abdullah, who arrived in Paris earlier this week on his first official trip to Europe since replacing Dr Mahathir Mohamad late last year, met Chirac over lunch at the Elysee presidential palace.

Chirac's office said the two had agreed to coordinate their efforts to help the United Nations achieve its Millennium Development Goals, which include halving poverty around the world by 2015.

The two leaders also discussed the situation in Iraq, the Middle East and the global fight against terrorism, aides to the French president said.

On Iraq, Chirac's office said Abdullah insisted that the United Nations play a significant role in the preparations for general elections scheduled for January 2005.

After meeting with US President George W Bush in Washington on Monday, Abdullah said Malaysia was prepared to send a military medical team to Iraq and help participate in the war-ravaged country's reconstruction.

At a Paris press conference on Wednesday, Abdullah would not give specifics about the size of the team, saying: "It has to be sufficiently big to enable us to do something worthwhile. It is certainly not going to be a token."

He also hinted that the unstable security situation in Iraq could push back the medics' departure, telling reporters: "Let us try not to anticipate too much. When we've decided to go, we will go."

In London today

Malaysia, which strongly opposed the US-led invasion to topple Saddam Hussein, has called on other Muslim countries in the region to help rebuild Iraq.

Abdullah is the current chairman of both the 57-member Organization of the Islamic Conference (OIC) and the 116-nation Non-Aligned Movement (NAM) of developing nations.

Chirac and Abdullah also discussed preparations for the Asia-Europe meeting scheduled to take place in Vietnam in October.

European Union foreign ministers agreed earlier this month to send a special envoy to Asia in an attempt to end a deadlock over Burma that could jeopardize the meeting.

After his stop in Paris, where he also met with French business leaders, the Malaysian prime minister was scheduled to travel to Britain for talks on Friday with his counterpart Tony Blair.