Emmanuel Macron said on Wednesday that Vladimir Putin was “alone” to have chosen war against Ukraine and called for “historic decisions” to make France and Europe “more independent”, in particular to ensure their defense.
Europe “must agree to pay the price for peace, freedom, democracy” and “invest more to depend less on other continents”, he asked in a televised address. For this, he promised that strong decisions would be taken by the 27 at the EU summit in Versailles on March 10 and 11.
“I will defend a strategy of European energy independence”, he detailed, because “we can no longer depend on others and in particular on Russian gas to move us, to heat us, to operate our factories”.
In addition “our European defense must take a new step” to no longer depend on others to defend itself, he believes.
France, it, “will increase the investment in its defense, decided from 2017″ and will pursue its strategy of economic independence”, he affirmed.
France “will take its part” to welcome Ukrainian refugees, he promised, in particular “by welcoming children forced into exile, separated from their father who remained in the fight”.
For him, it is “very alone and deliberately that renouncing one by one the commitments made before the community of nations, President Putin has chosen war”.
“Russia is not attacked, it is the aggressor”, “this war is not a conflict between NATO and Russia” and “even less a fight against Nazism, it is a lie”, he believes.
But “we are not at war against Russia”, he said, saying “alongside all Russians who refuse to have an unworthy war waged in their name”.
He also reiterated his readiness for dialogue with the Russian president. “I have chosen to stay in contact, as much as I can and as much as necessary, with President Putin to seek relentlessly to convince him to give up arms.”
He also warned that the conflict would weigh on the French economy. “Our agriculture, our industry, many economic sectors will suffer”. “Our growth will inevitably be affected by the increase in the price of oil, gas, raw materials has and will have consequences on our purchasing power”, he specified.
But the head of state promised to “protect” the French against this impact by helping the most exposed sectors, in particular to find new outlets for them.
He recalled having asked his Prime Minister Jean Castex “to draw up an economic and social resilience plan for the next few days to respond to all these difficulties”.
“The war in Europe no longer belongs to our history books or our school books, it is there, before our eyes,” he concluded.
Without mentioning his declaration of candidacy, he briefly underlined that “this war also comes to impact our democratic life and the electoral campaign which officially opens at the end of this week”, but “which will not prevent us from meeting on the ‘essential,’ he said.
Thursday, February 24, at the launch of the Russian invasion, the Head of State “had made a commitment to keep the French informed of the evolution of the situation”. A promise he renewed on Wednesday.