The Minister of Defense of France spoke by phone with Shoigu

On April 3, French Minister of Armed Forces Sébastien Lecornu spoke by phone with Russian Defense Minister Sergei Shoigu. This was reported by the French mass media and international agencies, and there is no comment from the Russian Ministry of Defense yet.

As stated in the statement of the French Ministry, Lecornu on behalf of France expressed solidarity with the victims of the terrorist attack in the Crocus City Hall near Moscow on March 22, as a result of which at least 144 people died.

It is reported that Lecorne has declared France’s readiness to fight terrorism and will strengthen cooperation with Russia in order to most effectively counter this threat.

The message also notes that the parties also discussed the war in Ukraine, and Lecornu said that France condemns the Russian invasion and will continue to support Kyiv.

The conversation took place at the initiative of the French side. This is the first direct conversation between the ministers since October 2022, when Shoigu called the defense ministers of Western countries with the statement that Ukraine allegedly wants to detonate the so-called dirty nuclear bomb (Russia has not presented evidence of such intentions since then).

Last month, French President Emmanuel Macron did not rule out sending military personnel from Western countries to Ukraine, which provoked a sharp reaction from Moscow, as well as the disagreement of a number of France’s NATO partners. Macron explained that we are not talking about any specific plans, and also about the participation of the military directly in hostilities. However, he continues to insist that it is not necessary to exclude the sending of military, including French, troops to Ukraine in order to create a situation of “strategic uncertainty” for Russia.

The recognized terrorist organization “Islamic State”, which previously carried out terrorist attacks in France, announced that it had staged an attack on “Crocus City Hall”. Alleged participants of the attack, natives of Tajikistan, were detained. Representatives of the Russian authorities claim, without providing evidence, that Ukraine could have been involved in the terrorist attack. Kyiv and its allies categorically reject this.