French President Emmanuel Macron on Wednesday refused to term Russia’s offensive in Ukraine ‘genocide’ and said that the people of both countries are fraternal. Speaking to broadcaster France 2, Macron said, “I would be discreet with terms today… Russians and Ukrainians are fraternal peoples. What is happening is madness, this is a return to war in Europe; but, at the same time, I am looking at the facts, I want to try as much as possible to stop this war and restore peace.”
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“I would say that Russia unilaterally unleashed the most brutal war, that it is now established that war crimes were committed by the Russian army and that it is now necessary to find those responsible and make them face justice,” Macron said and added it was best to be careful with terminology on genocide in this situation.
The French president also told France 2 that he is planning to hold talks with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky and possibly with his Russian counterpart Vladimir Putin soon.
His comments come in the backdrop of United States President Joe Biden calling the nearly two-month-old war in Ukraine ‘genocide’.
“Yes, I called it genocide. It’s become clearer and clearer that Putin is just trying to wipe out the idea of even being a Ukrainian,” Biden, who is at the forefront of the global condemnation of the war, told reporters on Tuesday.
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The Kremlin, severely censured Biden’s remarks and said that his genocide claim is wrong and unacceptable.
Speaking to reporters, Kremlin spokesperson Dmitry Peskov said, “We consider this kind of effort to distort the situation unacceptable,” according to the news agency AFP.
Highlighting the well-known crimes committed by the US in recent times, Peskov added that such a remark from Joe Biden is hardly acceptable.
