No clear results yet from Russia rapprochement: France

France’s policy of pursuing dialogue with Russia has not yet brought concrete results, the defence minister said on Thursday, while defending a signature strategy of President Emmanuel Macron.

Macron, who sought to intensify the rapprochement in a video conference summit with Vladimir Putin last week, launched the policy last year by hosting the Russian president at his summer residence in France.

But the strategy has not been universally popular in Europe with Poland, the Baltic states and also Germany reportedly concerned it risks undermining NATO and a common EU front on Russia.

“If the question is ‘are there already tangible results in the dialogue that France launched with Russia?’, I would answer you very honestly that this is not yet the case,” Defence Minister Florence Parly told a committee of the European parliament in Brussels via video conference from Paris.

But she added: “We are aware that such a dialogue cannot produce immediate results. You have to be able to continue it over time.”

Macron had late last year hosted the first face-to-face talks in Paris between Putin and Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky on ending the conflict in the east of Ukraine.

But the diplomatic efforts have yet to find a long-term solution to the more than half-decade conflict.

In their talks last week, Macron accepted an invitation by Putin to visit Russia this year.