French President Emmanuel Macron seeks to have a dialogue with Russian President Vladimir Putin to pursue the de-escalation of tensions on the border of Ukraine amid threats of potential war.
Macron is set to call Putin on Friday. According to French government spokesperson Gabriel Attal, the goal of the talks is to pursue diplomacy and "push Russia to clarify its position and the aim of military maneuvering."
The meeting of Russian, Ukrainian, French, and German top advisers on Wednesday in Paris seemed to buy time for all parties, as they agreed to meet again in two weeks. However, France's pursuit to resolve the tensions in diplomatic ways challenges the efforts of the US and NATO to form a united front against Russia. Experts are divided on whether it will be sufficient to prevent a Russian invasion of Ukraine, as per Associated Press.
Amid the allegations of an invasion plot, Russia has denied planning an assault on Ukraine. But it has moved around 100,000 troops near the border in recent weeks. Moscow has been conducting military exercises at multiple locations. Such a move alerted the US and NATO, per Euronews.
Macron Pursues Diplomacy
Attal believes that Macron "is at the heart of efforts towards de-escalation." The French President is also set to speak with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy in the coming days.
Macron favors the resumption of the dialogue between Washington and Moscow in the previous weeks. However, he commented, the talks have not produced any concrete results.
The French leader admitted that "discussion with Russia is always difficult," based on his own experience in pursuing to build a personal relationship with Putin.
Macron and former German Chancellor Angela Merkel attempted to persuade EU leaders to hold a summit with Putin in June of last year. The Baltic countries and Poland were against the proposal, citing fears about meeting with the Russian President at a period when Europe's relations with Moscow were at an all-time low.
On the other hand, Macron has made a renewed effort over such a high-level summit in recent days. He emphasized that it would not interfere with existing negotiations between the US and NATO.
He insisted that the outlets "must be exploited until the end to get Russia back into a process of de-escalation, to get guarantees, and allow us to build a new (European) security and stability order."
Talks to De-escalate Russia-Ukraine Tension Needs More Time
On Wednesday, Paris hosted a meeting of top advisers from Germany, Russia, and Ukraine with the "Normandy format." The talks try to revive a dialogue that started in 2014, per New York Times.
To give up is to acknowledge that the political situation is no longer on the table," Macron said, who is optimistic that the recent talks would result in "positive expectations."
However, the four-nation discussions on resolving a separatist conflict in eastern Ukraine, which is part of a larger crisis between Moscow and Kyiv, took longer than expected.
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