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UKRAINE

Rallies in French capital call for peace in Ukraine

Protesters in Paris on Saturday demanded peace for Ukraine, a day after activists marked one year since the Russian invasion.

Published: 25 February 2023 18:07 CET
Rallies in French capital call for peace in Ukraine
Protestors take part in a demonstration in solidarity with Ukraine, in Paris, on February 25th, 2023, on the first anniversary of Russia's invasion of Ukraine. Photo by Emmanuel DUNAND / AFP

Several hundred people sang Ukraine’s national anthem at Place de la Republique in Paris before Ukrainian children dressed in traditional costume led a procession.

Hand on his heart, 73-year-old Volodymyr Kraftchenko, who fled Ukraine a year ago, condemned “those who violated our land and our rights”.

Paris rally Ukraine

People take part in a demonstration in solidarity with Ukraine, in Paris, on February 25th, 2023. Photo by Emmanuel DUNAND / AFP

There were also protests in Berlin, where about 10,000 people braved the falling snow to call for negotiations with Moscow rather than weapons deliveries to Ukraine.

On Friday, thousands of protesters across Europe marched against Moscow’s invasion of Ukraine.

Paris rally Ukraine

Members of the public attend a gathering in support of Ukraine on the Place de la Republique in Paris on February 24th, 2023, on the first anniversary of Russia’s invasion of Ukraine. Photo by Ludovic MARIN / AFP

Leaders around the world weighed in on the one-year anniversary of Russia invading Ukraine, the large majority pledging firm support for Kyiv despite Moscow’s defiance.

President Emmanuel Macron reiterated France’s support for Ukraine. “People of Ukraine, France stands by your side. To solidarity. To victory. To peace”, he tweeted.

On Saturday Macron announced he would visit China in early April, asking Beijing to help “put pressure” on Russia to end the war in Ukraine.

Macron urged Beijing “not to supply any arms to Russia” and sought Beijing’s help to “exert pressure on Russia to ensure it never uses chemical or nuclear weapons and it stops this aggression prior to negotiations”.

On Friday the French president spoke on the phone to Turkey’s leader Recep Tayyip Erdogan, where he said that “pressure on and isolation of Russia must be increased” to force Moscow to “give up” on its attack, according to his Elysee Palace office.

Erdogan has been able to maintain relations with Russian President Vladimir Putin by refusing to join Western sanctions on Russia and ramping up bilateral trade during the war.

The Turkish leader has used his good relations with both Moscow and Kyiv to try and mediate an end to the conflict.

Turkey hosted two early rounds of peace talks and helped strike a UN-backed agreement restoring Ukrainian grain deliveries across the Black Sea.

Erdogan has also repeatedly tried to bring Putin and Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky to Turkey for truce talks. His office said that he called for a “just peace” in Ukraine in a Friday phone call with Putin.

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POLITICS

Macron warns ‘mortal’ Europe needs credible defence

French President Emmanuel Macron on Thursday warned that Europe faced an existential threat from Russian aggression, calling on the continent to adopt a "credible" defence strategy less dependent on the United States.

Published: 25 April 2024 13:41 CEST
Macron warns 'mortal' Europe needs credible defence

He described Russia’s behaviour after its invasion of Ukraine as “uninhibited” and said it was no longer clear where Moscow’s “limits” lay.

Macron also sounded the alarm on what he described as disrespect of global trade rules by both Russia and China, calling on the European Union to revise its trade policy.

“Our Europe, today, is mortal and it can die,” he said.

“It can die and this depends only on our choices,” Macron said, warning that Europe was “not armed against the risks we face” in a world where the “rules of the game have changed”.

“Over the next decade… the risk is immense of (Europe) being weakened or even relegated,” he added, also pointing to the risk of Iran obtaining a nuclear weapon.

Macron returned to the same themes of a speech he gave in September 2017 months after taking office at the same location – the Sorbonne University in Paris – but in a context that seven years on has been turned upside down by Brexit, Covid and Russia’s invasion of Ukraine.

Macron champions the concept of European strategic autonomy in economy and defence, arguing that Europe needs to face crises like Russia’s invasion of Ukraine without relying on the US.

He urged Europe to be more a master of its own destiny, saying in the past it was over-dependent on Russia for energy and Washington for security.

He said the indispensable “sine qua non” for European security was “that Russia does not win the war of aggression in Ukraine”.

“We need to build this strategic concept of a credible European defence for ourselves,” Macron said, adding Europe could not be “a vassal” of the United States.

He said he would ask European partners for proposals in the next months and added that Europe also needed its own capacity in cyberdefence and cybersecurity.

Macron said preference should be given to European suppliers in the purchase of military equipment and backed the idea of a European loan to finance this effort.

Macron also called for a “revision” of EU trade policy to defend European interests, accusing both China and the United States of no longer respecting the rules of global commerce.

“It cannot work if we are the only ones in the world to respect the rules of trade — as they were written up 15 years ago — if the Chinese and the Americans no longer respect them by subsidising critical sectors.”

Macron is, after Brexit and the departure from power of German chancellor Angela Merkel, often seen by commentators as Europe’s number one leader.

But his party is facing embarrassment in June’s European elections, ranking well behind the far-right in opinion polls and even risking coming third behind the Socialists.

The head of the governing party’s list for the elections, the little-known Valerie Hayer, is failing to make an impact, especially in the face of the high-profile 28-year-old Jordan Bardella leading the far right and Raphael Glucksmann emerging as a new star on the left.

Macron made no reference to the elections in his speech, even though analysts say he is clearly seeking to wade into the campaign, with his speech reading as a manifesto for the continent’s future.

“The risk is that Europe will experience a decline and we are already starting to see this despite all our efforts,” he warned.

“We are still too slow and not ambitious enough,” he added, urging a “powerful Europe”, which “is respected”, “ensures its security” and regains “its strategic autonomy”.

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