Tag: president of the French Republic

The French president, Emmanuel Macron, has said it should not be taken for granted that the EU would grant the UK a long extension on its departure from the bloc. Welcoming Ireland’s Leo Varadkar to Paris for talks at the Élysée on Tuesday, Macron said that as the clock ticked down and a no-deal Brexit became more likely, it was far from evident that the EU would agree to a British request for a further article 50 extension. “A long extension, implying the UK takes part in European elections and European institutions, has nothing easy or automatic about it,” Macron said. “I say that again very strongly. Our priority must be the good functioning of the EU and the single market. The EU can’t be held hostage long-term by the resolution of a political crisis in the UK.” No-deal Brexit more likely by the day, says Michel Barnier Read more He continued: “The three times rejection of the withdrawal agreement by the House of Commons and the rejection of all alternative plans now puts us on the path of a UK exit without a deal. “As the European council decided in March, it’s now up to the UK to present a credible alternative plan backed by a majority before 10 April in order to avoid that. Publicly, he has positioned France as the toughest-talking nation in the Brexit saga, stressing the need for the UK to present a way forward. Macron said the EU’s priority was protecting its workings and the single market: “We have a future to build together in the EU and a future relationship to build with the UK, which will be an ally, but we can’t spend the next months still trying to fix the rules of our divorce and looking to the past.” Macron met Varadkar, the Irish taoiseach, to discuss no-deal plans for the Irish border as well as how to handle any extension request from Theresa May. Macron said the EU had total “unity and solidarity” with Ireland.

The politics around Chinese President Xi Jinping’s state visit to France were far from auspicious. Beijing has several reasons to dislike the China policy of Emmanuel Macron: This, in the language of Chinese foreign policy, amounts to a lack of “strategic trust”. These commercial deals reflect mutual corporate interests but also a Chinese effort to build trust on this state visit to France. French President Emmanuel Macron has been reluctant to sign a memorandum of understanding to take part in China’s “Belt and Road Initiative”. Xi Jinping’s Paris visit showed how hard it is for China and Europe to go beyond principled statements on critical issues such as the global reduction of carbon emissions. Photo: EPA-EFE Today, the issue that dominates Europe-China political discussions is the architecture of global governance. It is unnatural for a Chinese leader to hold an exchange with the German chancellor and the president of the European Commission during a state visit to France. In sum, Xi’s state visit to France ended on a positive note despite the quasi impossibility to agree on an international agenda of cooperation. Chinese diplomacy took Europe as it is, working in Rome with a divided and weakened Italy, in Paris with a Franco-German-EU coalition, treating the latter slightly better from the perspective of commercial deals. This clearly does not solve the problem of a lack of a political engine for Europe-China cooperation, not does it solve the numerous divergences between China and Europe on political values, governance models and the state of international affairs.