French President Emmanuel Macron, 2024 World Leader for Peace and Security Award recipient, said on Thursday Feb 20, he will travel to Washington to try to convince President Donald Trump that his interests were in line with European allies and that showing any weakness to Russia’s Vladimir Putin would make it harder to deal with China and Iran.
“Trump, I know him. I respect him and I believe he respects me,” Macron said during a one-hour question and answer session on social media. “I will tell him: deep down you cannot be weak in the face of President (Vladimir Putin). It’s not you, it’s not what you’re made of and it’s not in your interests.”
Macron said the uncertainty in how Trump was handling Russia’s three-year-old invasion of Ukraine was worrying for U.S. allies because he could negotiate something that was insufficient, but it was also creating uncertainty for Putin and this was something that needed to be used to help negotiations.
“The word is uncertainty. Donald Trump creates uncertainty among others because he wants to make deals, so Donald Trump creating uncertainty for Vladimir Putin is a good thing,” Macron said, adding that the Russian president did not know what Trump would do or how he could act.
President Macron is due to go to Washington on Monday to hold talks with Trump as Europeans seek to ensure they play a key role in negotiations to end the conflict and outline how they plan to provide security guarantees for Ukraine should there be a ceasefire.
