The administration of French President Emmanuel Macron announced today that during a telephone conversation with their Russian counterpart Vladimir Putin, the presidents discussed Syria and the hunger strike of Ukrainian director Oleg Sentsov.

From the Elysee Palace communique it follows that Macron “expressed to the Russian President his concern about Sentsov’s deteriorating condition and called on Russia to urgently find a humanitarian solution to this situation, making several proposals.” Putin promised to consider them, as well as provide urgent information about Sentsov’s condition, the report said.

The Kremlin website also published a message about the conversation. However, it follows that the parties spoke mainly about Syria, giving “a high assessment of the Russian-French operation carried out in July of this year to deliver and distribute humanitarian aid among the population of the Syrian province of Eastern Ghouta.”

“Some other topics were also touched upon,” the Kremlin said in a release. Putin's press secretary Dmitry Peskov confirmed that the presidents spoke about Sentsov. “Yes, the issue was raised,” Peskov said, without providing details.

Sentsov, sentenced in Russia on terrorism charges to 20 years in a maximum security colony, has been on a hunger strike since May 14, demanding the release of all Ukrainians held in Russia. This week, the director’s sister Natalya Kaplan said that Sentsov’s health condition had deteriorated critically. “Oleg gave me a letter through a lawyer, he almost doesn’t get up. He wrote that the end is near, and he is not talking about liberation,” she wrote.

The day before, the Commissioner for Human Rights in Russia, Tatyana Moskalkova, reported that she had received photographs of Oleg Sentsov from the colony, taken on August 9 with his consent. In the photo, Sentsov, dressed in a prison uniform, stands next to his bed by the window in his ward. The press bureau of the Federal Penitentiary Service for the Yamalo-Nenets Autonomous Okrug reported that Sentsov is under constant supervision by medical workers, his condition is “assessed as satisfactory.”

Macron discussed Sentsov's hunger strike with Putin