PARIS, May 19 (Xinhuanet) -- French Defense Minister Michele Alliot-Marie said on Thursday her country backs Germany's demand to discuss with fellow NATO allies the withdrawal of US nuclear weapons from German territory.

    The French minister made the remark in an interview with the Paris-based daily the International Herald Tribune published on Thursday.

    The French defense minister said she understood the demand by the German government to discuss the issue but stopped short of calling on Washington to pull the nuclear weapons out from Germany.

    Among a total of about 480 US nuclear weapons in Europe, some 150 are stationed on German soil.

    Also in the interview, Michele Alliot-Marie said NATO's ongoingpost-cold war transformation had made the question of France's rejoining the organization's integrated military structure irrelevant.

    "There is a future for NATO and France is participating in its transformation," said the minister.

    Reaffirming France's commitment to NATO, she said Paris had no intention to rejoin NATO's integrated military command from which France pulled out in 1966.

    "We don't need to rejoin the military structure because the structure itself, the functioning of NATO has considerably changedand we are part of all operations," she said, adding that France is the second-biggest contributor of troops to NATO.

    The minister stressed that both NATO and European military structures can coexist and complement each other in dealing with the security challenges that have emerged since the end of the Cold War, noting "NATO remains our ultimate security guarantee if there was a massive attack". Enditem