Putin visits France to meet Macron, will the 'knots' be untied?
French President Emmanuel Macron will receive and hold talks with Russian President Vladimir Putin at a resort in southern France on August 19.
For the first time, the heads of state of the two countries will hold a meeting here to discuss bilateral relations and other important international issues.
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| Mr. Macron and Mr. Putin. Photo: Irish Times. |
French President Emmanuel Macron has invited President Vladimir Putin to his summer residence in a resort in the south of France. Today, August 19, the Russian and French presidents will hold a meeting there for the first time.
In addition to the expanded meeting between the two sides, Mr. Putin and Mr. Macron will have a narrow meeting with an agenda to discuss bilateral relations, cooperation between Russia and the European Union (EU), the situation in Ukraine and Syria., Libya, Iran.
It is noteworthy that the high-level bilateral meeting between Mr. Macron and Mr. Putin will take place right before the G7 Summit. This is considered a choice with many messages from France, especially France is one of the G7 countries supporting the idea of gradually bringing Russia back to this group after Russia was expelled from the G8 in 2014.
In bilateral cooperation, expanding political dialogue is an urgent need for both sides. Apart from the regular contacts between Mr. Putin and Mr. Macron, other meeting formats are quite limited, especially after the events in Ukraine in 2014. This is a major obstacle to the development of bilateral relations.
New factors are also emerging in relations with the EU. This year, the EU will have important personnel changes in the European Council and the European Commission.
Over the past period, President Macron's active participation, as well as France's constructive role, have contributed to the full restoration of Russia's membership in the Council of Europe.
France, as one of the EU leaders, can facilitate EU dialogue with Moscow, especially since Russia has repeatedly expressed its readiness to resume political dialogue with the Union.
Personnel changes have also taken place in Ukraine with the election of Vladimir Zelensky as president. In the Normandy format, the leaders of Ukraine, Russia, France and Germany have not met since October 2016. Therefore, this meeting between the heads of Russia and France is expected to take concrete steps to resume negotiations in this format.
In addition, the issue of Iran's nuclear dossier continues to heat up after the US withdrew from the agreement and Iran restarted its nuclear program, and the Syrian crisis are also issues of concern to both sides.
Although these are old topics, finding solutions to these problems has long been difficult. However, there are opportunities because the door is opening at the Château de Bregancon - where the meeting between Mr. Putin and Mr. Macron will take place.
Experts say the meeting will help untie some of the knots and possibly create new steps forward in bilateral relations, as well as resolve current "hot" international issues./.
