Kateryna Chernoval20:18, 05/28/24

Macron said that the transfer to Ukraine of weapons capable of hitting Russian military targets is not an escalation / photo European Union

He spoke in favor of allowing Ukraine to strike military facilities on the territory of the Russian Federation, from which the occupiers attack Ukrainian cities.

French President Emmanuel Macron said that the transfer of long-range weapons to Ukraine, capable of hitting military facilities on the territory of the Russian Federation, is not an escalation of the conflict.

Such a statement was made at a joint briefing by the leader of France and Chancellor of Germany Olaf Scholz. Macron also spoke in support of allowing Ukraine to strike military facilities on the territory of the Russian Federation, from which the occupiers attack Ukrainian cities.

“Obviously, the first issue, as the chancellor just reminded us, is Ukraine and the security of our Europe and our country. Germany and France have shared this position from the very beginning, side by side, and our support for Ukraine will continue for so long and so intensively , as necessary. Together, we have strengthened our support in the past few months, and we have also created new multilateral channels for the implementation of the efforts that we identified at the conference in Paris on February 26. We are also in the process of increasing our support In a few days I will have the opportunity, and we discussed it with the chancellor, to return to the topic of additional opportunities and the continuation of our assistance to Ukraine,” Macron said.

He noted that there are clear frameworks of actions, which consist in “supporting Ukraine and doing everything necessary as long as it is necessary.”

“I have already spoken about this several times. And I will have the opportunity, when President Zelensky comes to France on D-Day (celebration of the 80th anniversary of the landing in Normandy, – UNIAN) next week, to receive him and at that time to talk very specifically about , what we are going to do. But I will not comment on inconsistent messages,” the French president added.

Macron recalled that he has repeatedly spoken about peace, because he believes that “this is our goal.”

“Ukraine, together with Switzerland, took the initiative to organize a conference that it itself called peaceful. So I think that ‘surrender’ is an unfortunate wording. ‘Peace’ does not mean the surrender of Ukraine. This is a very important moment, because today in Europe, in in all our countries there are false pacifists. If we follow the voice of the Russian president, they also took over the territory by force. This is not our vision of peace again: peace can only be strong, and this means respect for international law,” he explained.

The French leader added that he also does not think anyone believes that peace can be achieved by force of arms alone.

“Therefore, we have a simple principle, which is that we are in favor of negotiations, but on the condition that the decisions regarding them are made by both sides, in particular the Ukrainians, and that they take place on terms that are desirable and good for them, that they do not impose themselves on them. This is the opposite of capitulation,” Macron said.

At the same time, the French president emphasized that the framework of France’s actions in Ukraine remains unchanged.

“We support Ukraine in resistance and defense of its territory and do not want escalation. These are the same frameworks in which we want to operate. What has changed is that Russia has adapted its actions. Ukraine is under attack from bases in Russia. How will we explain to the Ukrainians that they are not allowed to attack the points from which the missiles are launched? In fact, we are telling them that we are supplying weapons, but we are not allowing them to defend themselves. We believe that they should be allowed to neutralize the military facilities from which the missiles were fired , and, in fact, the military facilities from which Ukraine was attacked. But we must not allow them to hit other targets in Russia. I think we can do that if we really want to achieve our goal. And I think we can to say that, in fact, we are not going to escalate, because it is Russia that is organizing the escalation,” Emmanuel Macron summed up.

(C)UNIAN 2024