The Kremlin has newly confirmed that France has restored "technical-level" contact and dialogue with Russia, afterfor years having stymied diplomacyrelated to the Ukraine war. "Yes, there have indeed been contacts, and we can confirm that," Putin spokesman Dmitry Peskovtoldreporters. "If there is the desire and the necessity, they could help fairly quickly reestablish dialogue at the highest level."
But ironically it's not necessarily for the sake of seeking to forge a peace deal in eastern European, but in reality towardensuring the United States doesn't mediate something less than satisfactory to Ukraine and Europe.
President Macronsaidin fresh remarks in a Tuesday interview: "What did I gain?Confirmation that Russia does not want peace right now." Yet he stipulated, "But above all, we have rebuilt those channels of discussion at a technical level."
He reasoned that Europe must be engaging Putin directly"so as not to depend on third parties"or rather - so the EU doesn't stay cut out of US-Russia discussions, as has been the case so far under Trump.
Peskov offered that Moscow understands Macron's motives. "That said, we did take note of President Macron’s statement about the need to establish relations with Russia. We find such statements encouraging," he stated.
Peskov further acknowledged that completely cutting off contact between Russia and Europe is "illogical, counterproductive and harmful for all sides."
"Russia has always supported maintaining dialogue, which, in our view and in our firm belief, can help address the most pressing and complex issues," he told a press briefing. "These problems will not resolve themselves, andconfrontation will not help solve them either."
The Macron government has meanwhile already made clear through earlier preparatory meetings on the level of advisers that itwill not "rubber-stamp" any Ukraine peace agreement without European leaders(or also without direct Ukrainian input), especially as it impacts EU security.
Meanwhile, Macron issimultaneously pledging to stand up to Trumpparticularly on issues which threaten to divideNATO unity:
"When there’s a clear act of aggression, I think what we should do isn’t bow down or try to reach a settlement,"Macron told Le Monde, the Financial Times and other newspapers in comments published on Tuesday. “We’ve tried that strategy for months. It’s not working,”
Source: ZeroHedge News
