An unacceptable day

Why has a long -planned visit of the Russian president to the capital of France has been canceled

According to the old plan, on October 19, Vladimir Putin was supposed to come to Paris to open the Russian spiritual and cultural Orthodox center and meet Francois Hollande. This was announced last Thursday by the Russian Minister of Foreign Affairs Lavrov, accepting the French Minister Airo in Moscow. And although the party had known the date of the visit for a couple of months, the announcement of Lavrov caused irritation in Paris: firstly, the guest had to announce when he would come to the owners, and secondly, the French did not want to confirm Hollande and Putin before Moscow did not express his position on the French resolution for the UN Security Council.

The resolution provided, first of all, the cessation of Aleppo bombing, and for the sake of adopting it, the Foreign Minister of Foreign Ministry on Thursday, October 6, urgently flew to Lavrov. Airo's emergency visit to Moscow did not lead to anything.

On the eve of the meeting in an interview with LCI, Airo called the position of the Russian authorities on Syria “cynicism”, but then he hinted that the “cynics” could still play back, stopping Aleppo's bombardment. When asked, “how can you believe Sergei Lavrov - you yourself used this term: they are absolutely cynical,” the French minister replied: “Yes, I used <This term”. But at the same time - you know it - everywhere, and in France, too, there are debates: how to behave in relation to Russia. There are those who say that you need to burn all bridges with Russia. There are those who say that you need to follow Moscow. But our choice: this is neither one nor the other. <...> We do not close the doors, the channels are not blocked, ”Airo said and immediately added:“ Today, around the world, people see the frames of this tragedy ( Aleppo bombardment . - Ed. ). Do you believe that Russia, which is a great country, civilization with a rich history, do you believe that it can be indifferent to this? ”

But since the meeting with Lavrov did not bring guarantees for the cessation of Aleppo bombing, answering Moscow to the question of the Russian journalist, whether France is ready to support the introduction of sanctions against Russia “in connection with the situation in Syria” ( a little earlier in the media appeared “leaks” that the German authorities are considering the possibility of imposing new sanctions by the EU ), Airo did not give a negative answer. “Sanctions against Russia exist, Sergei Lavrov just reminded of this. They are tied to the implementation of the Minsk agreements <...>. I arrived today on Syria and on the issue of Aleppo. I did not come with threats, I came to share the statement of the humanitarian drama in Aleppo and find solutions to stop this massacre. ”

Airo then recalled that now the UN Security Council is considering the French resolution, and it would be better if it was adopted: “If we put all our forces to save the world, then we can do it, and we will see it in the coming hours. In any case, France will not refuse any efforts. And this is the meaning of my visit (to Moscow). ”

The next day, on Friday, Airo flew to Washington to meet with Kerry. And on Saturday, a few hours before the vote in the Council of People's Commissars, Francois Hollande in an interview with TMC already directly spoke about his readiness to accept sanctions. And Vladimir Putin, on the contrary, cannot be accepted.

“After a few hours, we will learn the result of voting according to our resolution,” Hollande said. - It provides for a stop of any bombing, ceasefire and truce ... If one country (permanent member of the Security Council) will “suspend” this decision ... and you know very well, whom I am talking about ...

- About Russia?

- About Russia ... then this country will bear difficult responsibility. Because it will mean that she supports and commits war crimes.

In response to the question, does it seem to him that, talking with the Russian authorities, he turns into the void, the French president replied:

- I will probably accept Vladimir Putin. But I still ask myself the question, is it useful? Is this necessary? Could there be pressure? Can we still make him to stop what he does with the Syrian regime?

- Do you think that Vladimir Putin is listening to you?

- Do we think that you can put pressure? Otherwise, it makes no sense to talk, it makes no sense to put forward the resolution, as we did in the UN Security Council. We need to wage war .

- But to wage war with Russia is impossible ...

<...> What we are looking for is the world, not a war. So the pressure should be provided. At some point, sanctions can be imposed. And there are sanctions that we can use. No one should think that he <may remain> unpunished.

“At some point, sanctions may be imposed,” Hollande said before Putin's visit. - No one should think that it can remain unpunished "

The French president said that the guilty of “war crimes in Aleppo” will have to appear before the International Criminal Court. However, this is a distant and vague business, and new sanctions - if everything will continue in Syria, can fall on our heads quickly enough.

The fact that the sanctions work to achieve peace, Hollande was convinced by the example of Donbass: “Diplomacy serves in order to stop the massacre at some point ... When the angel Merkel and I intervened to achieve a truce in Ukraine, it took too much time, but in the end, we were able to achieve a ceasefire. Even if incidents are still happening now, this is no longer the war that we have seen. And we must achieve the same result for Aleppo and Syria, ”said the French president on Saturday.

So if on October 19, the planned meeting took place in Paris, Hollande would probably wave before the clear eyes of the Russian president of the same “sanctions club”. There is no longer a way out: scary shots with Aleppo bombing are spinning on European television channels every day. In addition, Europe over the past two years has seriously experienced part of the consequences of the Syrian war: both in the form of refugees and in the form of terrorists. The blind bombing of Aleppo give birth to "Jihadists tomorrow," said French Minister Airo Russian Minister Lavrov. And he recalled that terrorism threatens Russia.

“The Saturday veto of Russia is even more isolated in the international arena,” the Figaro newspaper wrote on Monday quite friendly in relation to the Russian authorities.

"Blind bombing Aleppo give birth to jihadists tomorrow ..."

“If Francois Hollande accepts Vladimir Putin, then in order to tell the truth, and not for secular courtesy,” French Minister Airo said on Monday.

The response to the desire of the French authorities to conduct a “frank conversation about Syria” could only be the refusal of the Russian president himself from the Parisian visit.

Paris