France insisted Sunday it reserved the right to decide on a possible early pullout of forces from Afghanistan despite Washington saying Paris had vowed to ensure the mission's "strength and effectiveness."

The apparent differences between the two NATO allies emerged after a renegade Afghan soldier on Friday shot dead four unarmed French troops and wounded 15 others at a base in the east of the country.

Turkish Foreign Minister Ahmet Davutoglu has cancelled a Brussels visit Monday in order to follow the French Senate's vote on a bill criminalizing the denial of Armenian genocide, a spokesman said.

"We decided to postpone this trip in order to stay in Turkey, regardless of the outcome of the vote at the French Senate," the ministry spokesman told Agence France Presse on Sunday.

Claims by French President Nicolas Sarkozy that Iran is seeking to develop a nuclear weapon are "baseless and far from reality," Iranian foreign ministry's spokesman said on Saturday.

"Apparently by making false claims, the French president wants to put pressure on Iran... (by forcing the imposition of) illegal and unfair sanctions," Ramin Mehmanparast said in a statement posted on the state broadcaster website.

A key Syrian opposition activist has left her homeland and is living in France, an online newspaper reported Saturday.

"I left Syria, in secret, at the request of the revolutionaries," Suhair al-Atassi told the website Mediapart.

French Defense Minister Gerard Longuet said Saturday that the French soldiers killed in Afghanistan were shot dead by Taliban "infiltrated for a long time" in the ranks of the Afghan army.

Longuet made the comments during a meeting with General Nazar, commander of the 3rd Afghan army brigade at their main base in eastern Afghanistan.

Former PM Saad Hariri broke his left leg while skiing in the French Alps, said his press office in a statement on Saturday.

He underwent a successful three-hour surgery in the American Hospital of Paris.

France appeared to lessen the prospect of an early withdrawal from the 10-year war in Afghanistan on Saturday, stressing its commitment to the country after an Afghan soldier killed four of its troops.

Defense Minister Gerard Longuet and Chief of Defense staff Admiral Edouard Guillaud flew into Afghanistan for emergency talks a day after the president threatened to order a swift exit of its 3,600 troops on the ground.

French President Nicolas Sarkozy stressed on Friday that his country will maintain its support for Lebanon, noting that French troops have been participating in the United Nations Interim Force in Lebanon for some 30 years.

He therefore warned that anyone who attacks a single French soldier will have to suffer the consequences of their action.

French President Nicolas Sarkozy urged "reason and dialogue" in the row with Turkey on the Armenian genocide, in a letter to Turkish Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan seen by Agence France Presse Friday.

"I hope we can make reason prevail and maintain our dialogue, as befits allied and friendly countries," Sarkozy wrote after Erdogan's government reacted strongly to a bill criminalizing denial of the Armenian genocide under Ottoman Turkish rule, which the French Senate will debate on Monday.

French President Nicolas Sarkozy warned Friday that any foreign military intervention against Iran's nuclear program would trigger "war and chaos" across the Middle East and beyond.

"Time is limited. France will do everything to avoid military intervention, but there is only one way to avoid it: a much tougher, more decisive, sanctions regime," Sarkozy told an audience of diplomats in Paris.