Latest Articles about France
Franco-German Proposals in the Normandy Forum: A Letdown to Ukraine
The Kremlin’s representative to negotiations over Russia’s war in Ukraine’s east, Dmitry Kozak, is undoubtedly the source of the outpouring of secret documents to the Russian daily Kommersant (March 24), revealing the negotiating positions of the parties to the Normandy process (Germany, France, Russia, Ukraine).... MORE
Beijing Speaks on the Proposed Group of Seven Expansion
Introduction Leaders of the Group of Seven (G7)—an informal bloc of industrialized nations which includes Britain, Canada, France, Germany, Italy, Japan and the United States—met virtually on February 19 in preparation for an upcoming June summit. The meeting focused on intensifying health cooperation; expanding vaccine... MORE
Does the Normandy Group on the Russia-Ukraine Conflict Have a Future? (Part Two)
*To read Part One, please click here. Kyiv is pinning its hopes on the new administration of United States President Joseph Biden to help rebalance and restart both the Normandy forum and the Minsk Contact Group (see Part One in EDM, February 4). The Minsk... MORE
Does the Normandy Group on the Russia-Ukraine Conflict Have a Future? (Part One)
Ukraine is multiplying calls for changing the composition of the “Normandy Four” group (Russia, Germany, France, Ukraine) and its derivative Minsk Contact Group (see below). The Kremlin has effectively used these negotiation forums from 2014 to date in order to conserve, instead of end, its... MORE
Can the Minsk Group on the Armenia-Azerbaijan Conflict Reinvent Itself? (Part Two)
*To read Part One, please click here. Russia, not the Minsk Group, will reinvent the Minsk Group, and is working on it (see Part One in EDM, January 28). The object is not the 12-nation Minsk Group Conference (this has been inactive since the mid-1990s),... MORE
Can the Minsk Group on the Armenia-Azerbaijan Conflict Reinvent Itself? (Part One)
The 44-day Second Karabakh War between Armenia and Azerbaijan, its Russian-mediated outcome, the launch of Russia’s own peacekeeping operation, and Turkey’s rise as a regional power have all exposed the Minsk Group’s irrelevance. Mandated by the Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe (OSCE) back... MORE
Navalny Has Set a Damning Dilemma for Putin’s Regime
The decision of Russian democratic opposition leader Alexei Navalny to return to Moscow was announced on January 13 in a deliberately matter-of-fact way—and produced a full-blown political storm. His message on Instagram was as plain as it gets: “The air-ticket for Sunday is just purchased,... MORE
The South Caucasus: New Realities After the Armenia-Azerbaijan War (Part Three)
*To read Part One, please click here. *To read Part Two, please click here. Russian President Vladimir Putin has recently supplanted the Minsk Group’s triple co-chairmanship (the United States, France, Russia) as mediator between Armenia and Azerbaijan. It was Putin, not the Minsk co-chairmanship, who... MORE
The South Caucasus: New Realities After the Armenia-Azerbaijan War (Part Two)
*To read Part One, please click here. Azerbaijan’s successful military action against Armenia’s occupying forces in Karabakh this autumn disproved Western diplomacy’s admonitions about post-Soviet “frozen conflicts” having “no military solutions” but “only political, negotiated solutions” with “no alternatives.” Armenia, however, had imposed its own... MORE
The Minsk Group: Karabakh War’s Diplomatic Casualty (Part Four)
*To read Part One, please click here. *To read Part Two, please click here. *To read Part Three, please click here. Over the past two decades, the main international mechanism for resolving the Armenian-Azerbaijani conflict over Karabakh—the Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe’s... MORE