2024-03-17 23:07:29
Paris (agencies)
French President Emmanuel Macron confirmed, in an interview published by Le Parisien newspaper, that ground operations in Ukraine by Westerners may be necessary “at some point.”
Macron said in the interview he gave the day before yesterday after his return from Berlin, where the German and Polish leaders met: “Perhaps at some point – I do not want that and will not take the initiative – there must be operations on the ground, whatever their form, to confront the Russian forces.” He added, “France’s strength is that we can do this.”
In the German capital, Macron met with Chancellor Olaf Scholz and Polish Prime Minister Donald Tusk, in a show of unity between the three countries.
Macron refuses to rule out the idea of sending ground forces to Ukraine, and his repeated statements on this subject have raised problems among Paris’s allies, led by Germany, and were met with almost unanimous rejection from the opposition in France.
In his interview with Le Parisien, Macron ruled out any disagreement between the French and Germans over this issue. He said: “I wanted to come to Germany very quickly so that there would not be a discussion about strategic differences that might exist, because they do not exist.”
He added, “There was no disagreement between me and the advisor at all. We have a very large consensus in views about the goals and the situation. It is the way of translating them that differs,” highlighting what he called the “strategic cultures” in the two countries.
He explained, “Germany has a strategic culture of extreme caution and non-interference, and it keeps its distance from nuclear weapons. This is a completely different model from the model of France, which is equipped with nuclear weapons and has maintained and strengthened a professional army.”
The French President added that he decided not to visit Kiev, and instead headed to Berlin to hold talks with Schulz and Tusk.
Macron previously confirmed that he would meet President Volodymyr Zelensky in Ukraine before mid-March, on a trip that was originally scheduled to take place in February before it was postponed.
Macron stated that his visit to Kiev will take place in the coming weeks.
Commenting on the French President’s words about sending forces to Ukraine, the Russian Foreign Ministry described the French hints as “strange things.”
Yesterday, Ministry spokeswoman Maria Zakharova explained that the French President makes “different” statements from time to time.
She added: “He constantly contradicts himself and says very strange things. First, he talks about sending forces from the European Union or NATO to the conflict zone, then he confirms that he will never try to do something like that.”
In a related development, the Russian Ministry of Defense announced that Moscow responded to a total of 35 attacks by Ukrainian drones during the night, including 16 attacks in the Krasnodar region in the south of the country alone.
Drones
Mayor of the Russian capital, Moscow, Sergei Sobyanin, announced yesterday that Russia had confronted four Ukrainian drones over the Moscow region.
Sobyanin said, via the Telegram application: The air defenses shot down two drones over the Domodedovo area, where the capital’s airport is located. He added that two drones were intercepted in the Ramenskoe and Stupino areas, confirming that there were no casualties or damage.
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