Sunak, Macron Prepare Show of Unity in Paris As Putin Looks On

By Staff, Agencies

Britain and France will aim to bury the hatchet Friday after seven years of feuding and send a message of Western unity to Vladimir Putin.

UK Prime Minister Rishi Sunak and French President Emmanuel Macron will meet in Paris for the first Anglo-French summit since 2018, with both leaders hoping to secure small-scale policy wins they can sell to domestic audiences.

But beyond the need for agreements on migration, energy and mobility for young people, greater forces are driving the squabbling neighbors toward a closer relationship after the bitterness sparked by the UK’s 2016 Brexit vote.

Sunak and Macron lead Western Europe’s two great military powers, and are painfully aware of the need to show Russia that the West remains unified in the face of its brutal war in Ukraine. Defense cooperation will be central to Friday’s discussions.

“There’s a war in Europe, we face a common threat, and it’s a test for our two countries which have the biggest armies in Europe and nuclear capabilities. We share a particular responsibility,” an Elysee official said.

Both sides are aware that with the eyes of the world upon them, there is more than a bilateral relationship at stake, added Pierre Haroche, a Paris-based defense lecturer at Queen Mary University.

“The Russians will be watching and will be attentive to the signals coming out of the summit. If it’s a disappointing summit, it’ll send a signal of weakness,” he said. 

Charles Grant, director of the think tank the Centre for European Reform, said Putin’s military operation in Ukraine has made Sunak and Macron realize “they need to get on better.”

“Britain and France can’t be at loggerheads if that’s going to make the West weaker vis-a-vis Russia, and potentially China as well,” he said.

The ground was laid for improved bilateral relations by last week’s landmark agreement between Britain and the European Commission over the Northern Ireland protocol, a bitterly-contested aspect of the UK’s post-Brexit trade agreement with Europe, which poisoned relations on both sides of the English Channel.

At Friday’s summit, Sunak and Macron are expected to discuss how best to continue to support Ukraine, and to call on Putin to resume Russia’s participation in the New START nuclear treaty, which places limitations on intercontinental ballistic missiles and nuclear warheads. The Russian president announced last month that he was suspending his country’s participation in the treaty.

According to Grant, the trickiest subject will be how the war should end, with two camps starting to emerge within the Western alliance.

The UK has so far aligned with the Nordic and Baltic countries, which are calling for the Western alliance to keep supporting Kyiv until it has at least recovered its post-2014 territory, or can negotiate a settlement with Moscow from a position of maximum strength. Some European allies have privately started to concede that Ukraine might need to give up some of its land in exchange for a peace deal.

“Trying to keep the Brits and the French together on Ukraine is quite important,” Grant said. “Macron is probably quite keen to make sure that the British are not going to go for a gung-ho, enthusiastic, kind of fighting-until-the-last-Ukrainian-is-dead, type of approach.”

Sophia Gaston, head of foreign policy at the London-based Policy Exchange think tank, said the French appreciate “the need to crystallize a clear message on France’s alignment with its allies,” adding: “Joint statements and initiatives to defeat Putin will be a key priority.”

To that end, officials on both sides hope to signal closer cooperation on defense and energy security.

Sunak and Macron will discuss the FC/ASW missile program, a new generation of cruise missiles being developed jointly by the UK and France. Paris halted the program in fury in September 2021 after Australia canceled a multi-billion-dollar submarine deal between the two nations in favor of a broader security partnership with the US and Britain.

The UK’s other big ask will be on migration, with Sunak desperate to show further progress on tackling the number of small boats crossing the Channel – an issue of intense interest to his UK Conservative Party and many of its core voters.

The Paris summit comes at the end of a high-stakes week for the British prime minister, in which he unveiled controversial new laws to deport almost all adult-age migrants who reach the UK illegally, regardless of their asylum status. EU Home Affairs Commissioner Ylva Johansson told POLITICO Tuesday she believes the plan breaks international law.

But both Sunak and Macron will be keen not to let the divisive topic of small boat arrivals overshadow the reset of their relationship.