The dialogue between Paris and Moscow continues. Emmanuel Macron again spoke for an hour on Tuesday with Vladimir Poutine, announced the Elysée, without an agreement for the ceasefire demanded by the French president.
For his eighth phone call with the Russian leader since the start of the invasion of Ukraine on February 24, “there is currently no agreement but the president (Macron) remains convinced of the need to continue its efforts”. “There is no way out but a ceasefire and Russia’s good faith negotiations with Ukraine. The President of the Republic stands alongside Ukraine,” added the Elysée.
A call for initiative from France
The Kremlin, for its part, contented itself with indicating that this meeting had taken place “on the initiative of the French party” and had focused on “the situation in Ukraine, including the negotiations in progress” between the Russian and Ukrainian representatives .
During their previous meeting, on March 18, the French president had expressed his “extreme concern” about the situation in Mariupol, bombarded by the Russian army, and called for “the lifting of the siege”. This Tuesday, in a video before the European Humanitarian Forum in Brussels, Emmanuel Macron also denounced the use by Russia “of explosive weapons in densely populated areas”, considering that “everything, in the aggression of the Ukraine by Russia, is unacceptable”.
The French president also called his Ukrainian counterpart Volodymyr Zelensky again on Tuesday, whom he has called very regularly since February 24 to assure him of his support. The Ukrainian president, who is calling on Vladimir Putin for direct negotiations, must intervene by video this Wednesday at 3 p.m. before French deputies and senators to ask for their support, after having done the same in recent days before Italian, American and Canadian elected officials. , British, German and Israeli. He also called on the EU on Monday to stop all trade with Russia.