A “private” meal away from the Elysée to mend things and show an image of European unity in the face of Beijing, after a “dangerous ice age”, which until recently worried the German press. Emmanuel Macron and Olaf Scholz notably discussed China on Thursday evening, during an informal dinner in a famous restaurant in the capital, to “align their positions” before the state visit to France by Chinese President Xi Jinping.
According to the entourage of the French Head of State, the Elysée proposed on this occasion to the German Chancellor to join the trilateral meeting scheduled for Monday between the French President, the President of the European Commission Ursula von der Leyen and Xi Jinping . The idea was to reissue the format of 2019, when Emmanuel Macron associated Chancellor Angela Merkel and Jean-Claude Juncker, predecessor of Ursula von der Leyen, with an exchange with his Chinese counterpart in Paris. But Olaf Scholz could not accept because he already has a trip planned to Latvia and Lithuania, it is argued on the French side. The agenda is in fact “set for a long time”, confirmed Friday in Berlin a spokesperson for the chancellery, Wolfgang Büchner, to the press, estimating that, as a result, the question of such German participation does not arise. is not really posed.
A dinner at La Rotonde
Thursday evening’s dinner between the French and German leaders, accompanied by their wives, at the Parisian brasserie La Rotonde where Emmanuel Macron is a regular, served as a framework for tuning in on Chinese issues.
The dinner was presented as “private” by the Elysée. Even if the meal was held away from the cameras, several official photos of the two couples, all smiles, were published immediately on social networks, including one shared simultaneously by the leaders themselves, says the media Politico.
In recent months, relations between the two men have been particularly fresh. At issue: growing disagreements on the Ukrainian issue, including the recent quarrel over the sending of “ground troops” to Ukraine, comments made by Emmanuel Macron in a long interview published this Thursday in The Economist. After the French head of state’s speech at the Sorbonne last week, Olaf Scholz nevertheless welcomed “good impulses” so that “Europe remains strong”.
Thursday evening’s conversation “will allow the President of the Republic to approach the discussion with Xi Jinping in a European way”, said a member of Emmanuel Macron’s entourage.
“The upstream consultation between Germany and France is always very close”, “it is a good exercise, and we will continue this Franco-German cooperation in this area, particularly on the theme of security”, declared for his part the spokesperson for the chancellor. Emmanuel Macron and Olaf Scholz spoke by videoconference before the chancellor’s visit to China in mid-April, and then discussed it on his return during a European summit in Brussels.