Moscow snubs Macron

Emmanuel Macron has been shot down by Moscow after claiming that Vladimir Putin assured him there would be “no deterioration or escalation” to the Ukraine situation during his five-hour talk with the Russian leader yesterday.

A Kremlin spokesman said this was “basically untrue”. Moscow went on to deny French claims that Putin had agreed to withdraw tens of thousands of troops involved in military exercises from Belarus, saying it was always planning to withdraw them.

The French President was keen to present his visit to Moscow as a resounding success as he travelled to meet Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky in Kiev on day two of his urgent round of shuttle diplomacy.

But the conflicting accounts are a blow to hopes of de-escalating tensions. The backdrop to Macron’s mission is a Western “alliance” that’s deeply divided over what to do about Putin, who still denies planning to invade Ukraine but hasn’t ruled out some sort of military action.

On the hawkish side are the US and UK. Writing in The Times yesterday, Boris Johnson talked tough, saying the UK’s support for Europe and NATO would remain “unconditional and immovable”. Britain will send 350 Royal Marines to Poland and the PM is considering sending warships and Typhoon jets to south eastern Europe in a show of solidarity.

And at a joint press conference with German Chancellor Olaf Scholz yesterday, Joe Biden said that if Russia invades Ukraine “there will be no longer a Nord Stream 2. We will put an end to it.” The pipeline, which the US begrudgingly gave the green light to last year, would deliver natural gas from Russia to Germany, by-passing Ukraine.

Scholz, standing beside Biden, insisted Germany and the US were “absolutely united”, but refused to even mention the pipeline by name, let alone commit to shutting it. Scholz, who has blocked allies from sending weapons to the region and is squeamish about committing to sanctions, is seen as the weak link on Russia.

Washington is also worried that Macron has gone rogue, pandering to Putin’s idea that NATO is an aggressive, expansionist alliance which poses a direct threat to Russia.

According to the New York Times, French officials have suggested that one prong of Macron’s diplomatic foray to Moscow was to explore the possibility of reinterpreting the Minsk 2 agreement in a way that’s palatable to Russia. This could involve some sort of special status for Ukraine’s eastern Donbas region – occupied by Russia since 2014 and coveted by Putin – in order to avert a full-scale war.

Minsk 2 secured a ceasefire in eastern Ukraine in 2015, but it’s proving unworkable because neither side agrees on what it means. At the heart of the document is the unresolved question: is Ukraine fully sovereign? Russia insists its sovereignty should be limited by Moscow. Ukraine, Germany and France – who were all involved in signing the agreement – disagree.

Pursuing this line would be risky business. Even entertaining the notion that Donbas could be on the table implicitly accepts Putin’s interpretation of Minsk 2 and his revisionist line. Biden doesn’t want to let Putin take an inch. He would see this as giving a mile.