French President Emmanuel Macron, in interview with French TV stations on Thursday, said France planned to sell Mirage 2000 warplanes to Ukraine. The Mirage 2000 is a French multi-role, single-engine, fourth-generation jet fighter.
“Tomorrow we will launch a new cooperation and announce the transfer of Mirage 2000-5 fighter jets to Ukraine made by French manufacturer Dassault and train their Ukrainian pilots in France,” Macron told French TV in a live interview.
The French president was speaking at the end of a day of commemorations of the D-Day landings on June 6, 1944, which Ukrainian President Voldymyr Zelensky had attended.
Ukraine has asked its Western allies send military instructors to train its forces on its soil to meet a growing challenge to build up troop numbers, Macron added.
"There is a challenge in capacity. That is why the Ukrainian president and his minister of defence asked all the allies – 48 hours ago in an official letter – saying 'we need you to train us quicker and that you do this on our soil'," Macron said.
Macron stressed that France did not want “the escalation of war”. But he stressed that "peace ... will only be achieved if Ukraine can resist".
“The situation is difficult,” the French president conceded, adding that the Russian army was striking “heavy blows" in the Kharkiv region.
"Peace cannot mean Ukraine's capitulation,” he pleaded.
"Peace must come through negotiation," he said. That moment, he felt, had not yet arrived “as Russia continues to advance”.
(FRANCE 24 with AFP)
