French President François Hollande decided having wine with lunch is more important than breaking bread with Iranian President Hassan Rouhani during an official visit to Paris.

Hollande scrapped Thursday's lunch at the Élysée Palace after Rouhani had asked for a halal menu in keeping with his Muslim faith, and that also meant no wine at the table during his first visit as president to the City of Light.

“It is not the halal which was a problem but the wine,” France's ambassador to the United States, Gérard Araud, said on Twitter. “Nobody should constrain anybody to drink or not to drink.”

Rouhani was offered a breakfast instead but turned it down.

Hollande’s decision means he’s likely to avoid the criticism leveled at Italian Prime Minister Matteo Renzi this week.
In Italy, where wine is just as much a part of the culinary routine as in France, officials submitted to the Iranian leader’s demands and did not serve wine at Monday's state dinner. Italian officials also covered up several nude statues with large boxes at Rome’s Campidoglio museum to protect the Islamic Republic visitors from gazing at artists’ renderings of the human form.

Renzi’s decision outraged critics.

"Respect for other cultures cannot and must not mean negating our own," said lawmaker Luca Squeri. "This isn't respect, it's canceling out differences and it's a kind of surrender."

Rome City Councilman Gianluca Peciola started an online petition demanding that Renzi explain "a disgraceful decision which is a mortification of art and culture as universal values."

The Iranian president did get a formal welcome Thursday from Hollande at the gold-domed Invalides monument where Napolean is buried.

Rouhani was touring Europe this week to drum up trade deals worth billions of dollars that include cars and planes. Business with the oil-rich nation is possible after international sanctions were lifted recently as part of the historic nuclear agreement Iran made in July with world powers.