Putin and Sarkozy hold Paris talks
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Vladimir Putin has met Nicolas Sarkozy, France’s president, to discuss soaring oil prices and EU-Russian relations during a visit to France, his first overseas trip since becoming prime minister.
Putin held talks with his French counterpart Francois Fillon in Paris before sitting down for a working dinner with Sarkozy at the Elysee palace.
The special treatment accorded to Putin, who was in office for eight years as president before handing over to Dmitry Medvedev three weeks ago, underscored the view from Paris that Putin was still an influential figure in Russia.
France was chosen for Putin’s visit because it will take over the presidency of the European Union on July 1.
Medvedev will make his European debut in Berlin in early June when he will meet Angela Merkel, Germany’s chancellor.
Energy concerns
Following the talks with Fillon on Thursday, Putin sidestepped questions on whether Russia would be prepared to help France and other consumer nations cope with soaring oil prices.
In a news conference with the French prime minister, Putin said: “Russia is not the one setting the price of oil, but the market.
“If Russia were setting the price, then I think we could agree, but that is not the case. Not yet.”
Earlier this week, France urged its partners in the Group of Seven industrial nations to press oil-producing nations to increase their output in a bid to bring down the price of oil, which has hit record highs of more than $130 a barrel.
Russia is the world’s second largest producer of oil and the number one supplier of natural gas.
EU-Russia pact
Russian officials said earlier on Thursday that Putin would be discussing plans for a new EU-Russia pact and Moscow’s relations with Nato.
On Monday, EU member states approved the launch of negotiations with Russia on a new partnership and co-operation agreement, putting an end to two years of acrimony over the issue.
Medvedev is due to host the launch of negotiations on the pact in June at an EU-Russia summit in the Siberian city of Khanty-Mansiisk, just before the start of the French EU presidency.
At a Nato summit earlier this year, France opposed offering speedy membership of Nato to the former Soviet republics of Ukraine and Georgia, saying there must be discussion with Russia on such a move.
Georgia and Ukraine have applied for a Membership Action Plan, which prepares nations for entry into the military alliance.
The Russian officials said that Putin would also discuss the implications of a US defence missile plan, to be stationed in eastern Europe, which Moscow fiercely opposes.
On Friday, the prime minister is due to tour a Cossack museum outside the French capital and pay a visit to the Paris home of French writer Maurice Druon, 90, whose works are popular in Russia.
Putin and Druon, whose father was Russian, have met several times including at the writer’s summer home in the Bordeaux region in 2003.
Filed by Anita Li under Global Financial Crises, Energy and Nuclear Safety, Arms Control, Proliferation and WMD