The newspaper writes that French President Emmanuel Macron’s trip to Africa will take place in a ‘weak position’ Finance Times With reference to French journalist and African expert Antoine Glaser.
Glaser noted that Russia’s influence in the continent increased, France switched to defense after the completion of the anti-terrorist operation Barkhan, and French companies lost market share.
According to the expert, Macron will fight a “hard fight” on this trip to win countries on the African continent, which are “increasingly resisting the intervention of the former colonial powers in their internal affairs.”
Macron is set to visit Gabon, Angola, the Congo and the Democratic Republic of the Congo on his 18th visit to Africa since taking office in 2017, when he promised to implement a new “partnership of equals” approach to the region. The author of the article states that this goal has been difficult for Macron to achieve.
In 2022, the French army left Mali, which has been in the region since 2014, as part of the anti-terrorist operation Barkhan.
In the summer of 2021, Macron announced that Paris will change the model of its military presence in the Sahel: Operation Barkhan will be completed in its current form and will be replaced by an international alliance that will include the countries of the region and other partners.
Earlier, the French Foreign Ministry accused Russia of carrying out a “neo-colonial policy” on the continent. Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov evaluated this statement. declarationhe talks about this being a clinical case, an attempt to “go from a sick head to a healthy one”.