French President Francois Hollande has said failure to act in the Middle East risks stoking an "all-out war."
Hollande was addressing the European Parliament in Strasbourg on October 7 alongside German Chancellor Angela Merkel.
"If we let the religious confrontations...get bigger still, let's not think that we will be protected. It will be all-out war, a war that could also affect our own territories," Hollande said, pointing to the increasing clashes between Sunni Arabs and Shi'a.
"What happens in Syria concerns Europe, what happens there will determine the balance of the whole region for a long time," he added.
"We have to construct in Syria, with all those who can contribute, a political future which gives the Syrian people an alternative” to President Bashar al-Assad or the Islamic State group, the French president also said.