Contents tagged with France

  • Ukrainian President Poroshenko meets with Merkel and Macron in Germany

    On Thursday May 10, Ukrainian President Petro Poroshenko, German Chancellor Angela Merkel and French President Emmanuel Macron met in the German city of Aachen. The key topics of the trilateral negotiations were sanctions against Russia, the implementation of the Minsk agreements, and the matter of peacekeepers in the Donbas.

    At the meeting, the heads of state discussed the possibility of placing new sanctions on Russia for holding illegal elections in annexed Crimea.

    “Obviously we spoke …

  • French and German Foreign Ministers expect Russia’s 'constructive contribution' to resolving the crisis in the Donbas

    Germany and France expect Vladimir Putin’s "constructive participation in resolving international conflicts." Russia should help resolve the crises in Syria and Ukraine, as well as other problems, Foreign Minister of Germany Heiko Maas stated during a meeting with his French counterpart Jean-Yves Le Drian in Berlin on Monday, May 7, Radio Liberty reported. According to the German ambassador, Berlin and Paris are interested in dialogue with Moscow and expect from it "constructive contribution …

  • Macron explains what he expects from Putin and Russian politics

    French President Emmanuel Macron stated that it was France’s goal to allow Russia to strengthen its position in Europe and not to fall into isolation. He said he would like to maintain “historic dialogue" with Russian President Vladimir Putin.

    "Putin dreams of Russia reemerging as a great power under the influence of humiliation because of the events around the fall of the Berlin Wall and the collapse of the USSR... I can understand that. But for me, Russia is Europe, even if Russia has almost …

  • French Ambassador: there is a risk that reforms will be negated in Ukraine

    At a joint interview with German Ambassador to Ukraine Ernst Reichel with Interfax-Ukraine , the Ambassador of France to Ukraine, Isabelle Dumont said that she believes that Ukraine has not yet reached the point of no return and that reforms in the state should continue.

    "Basically, the question is something we all have been asking ourselves for the past years: Have we reached the point of no return [in the reform process]? I think, fortunately, not yet," Dumont said.

    She also noted that …

  • UK and France refuse to attend Russian-initiated briefing at OPCW

    The Permanent Representative of Great Britain to the Organization for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons (OPCW), Peter Wilson said that the briefing initiated by Russia at the OPCW headquarters in The Hague on Thursday, April 26 was a “stunt.” The Russians claim that the event, which was attended by several residents of the Syrian city of the Douma, proves the absence of any chemical attacks in the vicinity of the city.

    The United Kingdom and its allies declined to attend this briefing. The …

  • Paris: Russian warplanes harass French warships off Syrian coast

    Chief of Staff of the French Navy, Admiral Christophe Prazuck, reported that Russian Military aircrafts have approached French warships eight times “over the past eight months.”

    Agence France-Presse quoted this information from Prazuck, who spoke before the Senate’s international and security commission on April 11.

    The Admiral noted that the French frigate has been located off the coast of Syria since 2015. He added that at the beginning of April 2018, the French warship Aquitaine was …

  • Media: Assad gave up his Legion of Honor medal after France’s strike on Syria

    Syrian President Bashar al-Assad returned to France his National Order of the Legion of Honor medal that he received from former French President Jacques Chirac in 2001, Le Parisien reports. According to representatives of the Syrian administration, it was returned because of France's participation in the "trilateral aggression" against Syria.

    The Syrian leader pre-empted the French authorities who had announced earlier that they would start the procedure for recalling the award from President …

  • France accuses Russia of making false statements about the chemical attack in Syria

    Russia is spreading contradictory statements on the chemical attack in the Syrian city of Douma, said the French Ministry for Foreign Affairs in a statement published on the Ministry's website. These statements contradict the facts gathered by Paris, French diplomats stated.

    French officials stated that the experts of the Organization for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons (OPCW) still do not have access to the place where the chemical attack took place. According to the French Foreign …

  • Russia to stop outsourcing An-124 cargo aircraft to NATO

    The Russian cargo aviation company Volga-Dnepr will stop providing An-124 heavyweight cargo aircraft to NATO by the end of the year, the French publication Challenges reports.

    According to the publication, Russia made the decision in response to recently tightened sanctions by the US.

    In 2006, a joint enterprise between the Ukrainian company Antonov Airlines and the Russian air cargo company Volga-Dnepr was established as a part of SALIS (Strategic Airlift International Solution) project.

       …

  • Macron: France convinced Trump to limit targets in Syria strike

    During an interview with BFM TV, French President Emmanuel Macron said that it was France that convinced US President Donald Trump to limit the strike it inflicted against facilities in Syria.

    "We convinced Trump to limit the targets of the strikes only to sites with chemical weapons capacity," he said.

    According to Macron, the US media and Trump’s Twitter initially used more aggressive rhetoric.  

    He also noted that Paris earlier persuaded Washington to stay in Syria.

    "Ten days ago, …