French President Emmanuel Macron plans to hold another telephone conversation with Russian leader Vladimir Putin on March 29, French Foreign Ministry Spokesperson Anne Claire Legendre told BFM TV.
“President Macron plans to once again speak with Vladimir Putin on Tuesday,” she said.
Legendre pointed out that the French leader “has held a series of long conversations with the Russian president.” “France intends to keep the channel for dialogue open,” she added. The French Foreign Ministry spokesperson also said that Macron expected to discuss with Putin the details of a planned humanitarian operation aimed at evacuating civilians from Mariupol with the assistance of Greece and Turkey.
When asked to comment on Russian top diplomat Sergey Lavrov’s remark about Moscow’s plans to take retaliatory visa measures against unfriendly countries, Legendre noted that “all EU nations are on the list of unfriendly countries.” “We don’t know at this point what approach Russia will actually take,” she said, adding: “It may turn out to be one of the retaliatory measures that Russia announced earlier.”
Macron visited Moscow on February 7 for talks with his Russian counterpart and made a trip to the Ukrainian capital of Kiev the next day. Putin and Macron have been holding regular phone calls since their Moscow meeting. Their previous telephone conversation took place on March 22.
On February 24, Russian President Vladimir Putin announced a special military operation based on a request from the heads of the Donbass republics. In response, the United States, the European Union, the United Kingdom and a number of other countries announced sanctions on Russian individuals and entities.
Source: Agencies
