The French Foreign Ministry said on Tuesday that Russia had refused to meet with France, Ukraine and Germany to discuss the conflict in eastern Ukraine.
Thus, the French diplomats denied the assertions of the Russian Foreign Ministry that Paris did not respond to Moscow’s proposals.
“This is not true”, – said the spokesman for the French Foreign Ministry Anne-Claire Legendre in response to Russian statements that neither Paris nor Berlin responded to Moscow’s proposals on a draft preparatory statement for such a meeting.
According to Legendre, “France and Germany responded to the proposals of Russia: they offered to hold a ministerial meeting in the” Normandy format “, which the Russian Foreign Minister refused.”
In early October, the President of Ukraine Volodymyr Zelenskyy discussed via videoconference with the Chancellor of Germany Angela Merkel and the President of France Emmanuel Macron preparation for the next Normandy Four summit.
The last time the leaders of the Normandy Four – the leaders of Ukraine, Germany, France and Russia – met on December 9, 2019 in Paris.
Since then, due to the coronavirus pandemic, contacts have gone online, but Russia refuses to hold a new summit even in this way. Meanwhile, from time to time only meetings of political advisers to the leaders take place in the “Normandy” format, but because of Russia’s position they practically do not yield concrete results.
–
– .
