Macron proposes to reset relations with Russia
During a visit to Finland, French President Emmanuel Macron said that "a full renewal" is needed in relations with Russia.
"I believe that we need a complete renewal of our relations with Russia set at the end of the Cold War. Our actions - both on the one hand and on the other - sometimes involve mistakes or misunderstandings that we inherited from the last two decades and that prevent us from making the right conclusions, "said Macron at a news conference with the Finnish President in Helsinki.
"We have a lot of work to do, considering all the difficulties that we have undergone in recent years, but this work needs to be done. We need to continue the dialogue," the French leader said.
Macron said that the dialogue with Russia should be conducted under two conditions.
First of all, "we must be much stronger inside the European Union, we should have strategic autonomy," he said. In his opinion, without "a sufficiently strong defense and security system, there can be no question about strategic partnerships."
The second condition for Macron was the settlement of the conflict in the Donbas. Russia should "give signals" that it is ready to implement the Minsk agreements. "It's not about forgetting about everything that happened in recent years It would not be a very good method. With a realistic approach and with the conditions that I've listed here, we need to deepen cooperation," the French leader outlined European-Russian relations and said that it required a will on both sides.