PARIS (AP) — France’s prime minister on Monday tore into U.S. President Donald Trump’s Oval Workplace thrashing of Volodymyr Zelenskyy, calling it a staggering present of “brutality” that aimed to humiliate Ukraine’s chief and bend him to the desire of Russian President Vladimir Putin.
The terribly frank criticism from Prime Minister François Bayrou, talking in a parliamentary debate on Ukraine, diverged from the extra nuanced tone that French President Emmanuel Macron has adopted within the wake of the conflict on the White Home on Friday and dropped the diplomatic niceties that typically mark French-U.S. relations.
“On Friday night time, within the Oval Workplace of the White Home, a staggering scene unfurled earlier than the lenses of the complete world, marked by brutality, a want to humiliate, with the objective of constructing Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy fold by means of threats, in order that he offers in to the calls for of his aggressors,” Bayrou mentioned.
“All this was summed up in a single phrase earlier than the planet’s cameras: ‘Both you discover a take care of Putin or we’ll abandon you,’” Bayrou mentioned, apparently referring to Trump’s feedback within the Oval Workplace. Trump’s precise phrases to Zelenskyy have been “you’re both going to make a deal or we’re out.”
Persevering with his speech to France’s parliament, Bayrou added: “For the glory of democratic accountability, for the glory of Ukraine and, I dare say, for the glory of Europe, President Zelenskyy didn’t fold and I feel we are able to present him our appreciation.”
Lawmakers bought to their ft within the Nationwide Meeting chamber to applaud.
Bayrou’s grim outlook for Europe
In opening the parliamentary debate, Bayrou mentioned that Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine and its diplomatic fallout have left Europe in grave peril. He spoke of “an historic scenario that in our eyes is probably the most critical, probably the most destabilized, probably the most harmful of all people who our nation and our continent have skilled because the finish of World Conflict II.”
The French prime minister mentioned that the Oval Workplace scene — the place Zelenskyy was berated each by Trump and U.S. Vice President JD Vance earlier than being requested to go away the White Home — left “two victims.”
The primary, Bayrou mentioned, was Ukraine’s safety.
The second was each the trans-Atlantic relationship with conventional American allies and Washington’s picture, he mentioned. Bayrou mentioned that the Oval Workplace scene “compromised one other elementary alliance: the one which america had with themselves, their historical past, and with a sure supreme of defending the legislation, of defending the weak towards the forces of tyranny.”
Bayrou has been Macron’s prime minister since December. Though Bayrou doesn’t converse instantly for the presidency, the veteran French politician has lengthy been an important accomplice for Macron. In opening his handle to parliament, Bayrou mentioned that he was talking for Macron’s authorities.
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John Leicester reported from Le Pecq.