France’s President Emmanuel Macron this week sent an adviser to Moscow, an informed source said Thursday, as a Russian minister said Vladimir Putin was ready to receive the French leader’s call.
Emmanuel Bonne on Tuesday discreetly met Kremlin aide Yuri Ushakov, the source with knowledge of the visit said, though neither Macron’s office nor the Kremlin wished to confirm or deny the trip.
The meeting — which the Macron informed his Ukrainian counterpart Volodymyr Zelensky about — is the first of its kind since Russia launched its full-scale invasion of Ukraine in 2022, the source said.
It could be the premise to the first phone call between both leaders in months.
Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov on Thursday said Putin was prepared to speak to Macron.
“If you want to call and discuss something seriously, then call,” he said in an interview to state-run broadcaster RT.
“The Russian president will always pick up the phone, listen to any proposals, and if we’re talking about serious proposals, I can assure you they won’t go without a serious, concrete, and practical response,” he added.
The two presidents last spoke in July, in their first known phone talks in over two-and-a-half years.
The French leader tried in a series of phone calls in 2022 to warn Putin against invading Ukraine and travelled to Moscow early that year.
He kept up phone contact with Putin after the invasion but talks then ceased, with the last call between the presidents dating back to September 2022.
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