The announcement of the trip, planned Monday 7 and Tuesday, February 8, follows telephone interviews of the president with his Russian and Ukrainian counterparts, Vladimir Putin and Volodymyr Zelensky.
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The double visit was approved during interviews with Vladimir Putin and Volodymyr Zelensky, the Russian and Ukrainian presidents, Thursday 3 February in the evening: Emmanuel Macron will visit Moscow, Monday, February 7, and in Kiev, Tuesday, In order to attempt to start a de-escalation between the two countries. The head of state could also, on the road back, make a stage in Berlin, to talk to the Chancellor, Olaf Scholz, and Polish President Andrzej Duda. According to the Elysée, this trip is a very tight agenda of consultations between the President of the Republic and his Western counterparts, while the Russian military deployment on the border of Ukraine is still so threatening, at the point of Encourage the United States and Great Britain to warn against the imminence of an attack.
If the French leader has already gone in Russia since the beginning of his mandate, and is very important to keep in touch with Mr. Putin, even at the worst moments of tensions, this is the first time that Mr. Macron is will make in Ukraine. Mr. Zelensky had invited him, in vain, several times since his arrival in power. While welcoming the mediation efforts undertaken by the Head of State, Ukrainian diplomats did not hide, in recent days, their eagerness to bring it, but feared that his visit be associated with a trip to Russia.
To calm the game, two topics were discussed during Mr. Macron’s preparatory calls with Russian and Ukrainian leaders. On the one hand, the recovery, still embryonic, of the Franco-German mediation about the conflict in the Donbass. After a first meeting in Paris last week, a new one must take place between the German, French, Russian and Ukrainian representatives on February 10 in Berlin. The Elysee explains to “capitalize on recent positive advances in” Normandy format “[between the four countries] to achieve a lasting solution in the Donbass”.
In the field, the ceasefire seems to be respected for a week, as are the Ukrainian diplomats. But, among the main blocking points, which have hindered the implementation of the Minsk agreements signed in 2015, is still figured and always the status of the separatist republics of Lugansk and Donetsk, supported by Russia. Mr. Putin demands that he be clarified, but the Ukrainians refuse any direct discussion with the separatist leaders.
New European security order
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