France is attempting to play a bigger role in NATO as President Nicholas Sarkozy announced the country would rejoin the alliance's command.

France, a NATO member, has stayed outside the central decision-making body for four decades.

"The time has come to put an end to this situation," Sarkozy said on Wednesday, adding that the new situation requires more international military cooperation.

"It is in France's interest and that of Europe. In concluding this long process, France will be stronger and more influential," he said.

In 1966, then President Charles de Gaulle withdrew France from the command and evicted all allied troops and bases from the country in an attempt to maintain a bigger sovereignty of the country.

Sarkozy said France, the fourth biggest contributor of troops to NATO,should play a bigger role in the alliance and international affairs.

"We commit the lives of our soldiers, but do not participate in the committee that defines strategy and operations," he said.

"We have to stop deluding ourselves that burying our heads in the sand, and we are capable of protecting anything," he added.

Commenting on some leftist and conservative lawmakers' fears that too close ties with the U.S.-led alliance would harm France's independence, Sarkozy said France would stick to its independence, and have a bigger say on the world stage.

The president said France would keep its nuclear force independent, and officials have said the country would not participate in NATO's nuclear planning committee.

The Pentagon swiftly welcomed Sarkozy's announcement.

"We are delighted that after a 43-year absence France is back where it belongs, in the command structure of the alliance it helped found," Pentagon spokesman Geoff Morrell said.

NATO Secretary General Jaap de Hoop Scheffer also expressed his welcome.

"France has always been an important ally within NATO ... Its full participation in all the civil and military decision-making and planning processes cannot but strengthen the alliance further," he said.

Scheffer said Sarkozy's move represents the culmination of a steady rapprochement with NATO on France's part over the last 15 years and a new boost to relations between France and the alliance.

The French parliament will debate the issue next week. Sarkozy has said he would write to all NATO allies to inform them of his decision should the parliament approve it.

If France fully returns to NATO, it could receive two command posts, one in Norfolk, Virginia, responsible for defining the strategic transformation of the organization, and another in Lisbon, Portugal.

(Xinhua News Agency March 13, 2009)