French President Emmanuel Macron refused a request from Moscow to take a Covid test when he met Vladimir Putin this week in order to prevent Russia obtaining his DNA, according to sources.
As a result, Mr Macron was kept at a distance from the Russian leader during their talks on the Ukraine crisis in Moscow, two sources from his entourage told Reuters.
The two leaders were photographed at opposite ends of a table so long that it provoked laughter and memes on social media as well as speculation, including by diplomats, that Mr Putin might be using it as a power play.
The French president was reportedly given a choice: either to accept an RT-PCR test done by the Russian authorities — and be allowed to stand next to Mr Putin in close quarters — or refuse and have to abide by rigorous social distancing rules.
One of the sources said: “We knew very well that meant no handshake and that long table. But we could not accept that they get their hands on the president’s DNA.”
A second source in Mr Macron’s entourage said he instead took a French PCR test before departure and an antigen test done by his own doctor once in Russia.
“The Russians told us Putin needed to be kept in a strict health bubble,” the second source was quoted as saying.
Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov confirmed that Mr Macron had refused the test and said Russia had no problem with this, but it meant that a 6-metre (20 feet) distance from Mr Putin was required in order to protect the Kremlin leader’s health.
“There is no politics in this, it does not interfere with negotiations in any way,” he said.
In recent weeks, Mr Putin has also hosted Hungary’s strongman Viktor Orban – his closest ally in the European Union – and Iranian president Ebrahim Raisi, in both cases maintaining distance from his counterparts at opposite ends of the outlandishly large table.
However, days after Mr Putin kept his French counterpart at a distance, the Russian leader met with Kazakh President Kassym-Jomart Tokayev. The two men shook hands, and sat close to each other, divided only by a small coffee table.
