How Macron became a tight Zelensky ally

It sounded like a friend is calling.

“Sorry, Emmanuel,” said President Volodymyr Zelensky from Ukraine and answered his phone in the middle of an online press conference at the end of March. “I only have a conversation with journalists. Can I be back in a few minutes?” At the other end of the phone, Emmanuel Macron, the French President, called directly. He could wait, it seemed.

“Yes, please. Thank you, thank you, Emmanuel! Ok, great, great. Bye,” went on Mr. Zelensky, before he put on and said the journalist that he speaks to Mr. Macron almost every day.

According to interviews with 11 people who worked closely with Mr. Macron or Mr. Zelensky, this call reflected a real bond between the two guides, which were characterized by mutual respect, trust and personal consideration. This connection, so many of these people, is based on the foundation of a common interest – defends the sovereignty of Ukraine and distracts further Russian interventions.

The people interviewed were present at critical places since the two men met. And they offer a portrait of a relationship that goes beyond a strategic partnership beyond the war between Russia and Ukraine.

“You have a rare relationship between trust and accountability,” said Alice Rufo, director of the General for International Relations and Strategy in the French Ministry of Defense and the deputy diplomatic consultant of Macron until 2022.

The French President, who arrived in Kyiv on Saturday morning, the capital of Ukraine, with three other European leaders, sees Mr. Zelensky as a brave guide who embodies Ukrainian resistance, is uncomplicated and crucial, according to some of the people surveyed. And Mr. Zelensky, who often calls Mr. Macron under his first name during the speech, sees Mr. Macron as someone who holds his word, stand up for Kyiv’s interests and help him to control difficult relationships with foreign leaders such as President Trump.

The men no longer go through formal diplomatic channels, but take up the phone and call themselves directly – on safe lines, WhatsApp and signal. Your conversations often have agendas, but sometimes they sound each other to check something or sound an idea. Occasionally, like after a Russian rocket that the hometown Kryvyi Rih had met by Mr. Zelensky, 19 people killed and converted a playground into a macabre corpse, Mr. Macron simply calls up out of concern and friendship.

During Mr. Zelensky’s official campaign, Mr. Macron welcomed the comedian, who became a politician for the Élysée Palace in Paris – a rare invitation for every candidate, let alone a relatively unknown and tried and tested one. Mr. Zelensky at home helped that. Shortly afterwards, Mr. Zelensky was elected President in A April 2019 in a surprise.

“He was very grateful for the visible support of an established personality, a G7 head of state,” said Vadym Prystaiko, a former foreign minister under Mr. Zelensky.

Mr. Macron was interested in Mr. Zelensky’s campaign to unite his country, bring it closer to Europe and end the war with Russia, which began with the illegal annexation of Crimea in 2014. From the beginning he liked the direct and energetic style of the Ukrainian, which reflected himself. They were both 41 – just a month apart.

“Macron liked the story of Zelensky, the unexpected president because Macron was also the unexpected president,” said Nathalie Loiseau, a former foreign minister under Mr. Macron. “They were both outsiders that people hadn’t bet on.”

The first state visit by Mr. Zelensky as a newly elected Ukrainian president was to Paris in June 2019. Later this year he returned to his first and only – direct conversations with President Vladimir V. Putin from Russia about the war between their countries.

At that time, Mr. Macron himself tried to find a diplomatic solution for the conflict between Russia and Ukraine. He regularly spoke to Mr. Putin, welcomed him several times in France and visited Moscow in February 2022, only weeks before she started to take full invasion of Ukraine in Ukraine in Ukraine until the last moment when he could prevent the Russian president.

Even after the invasion, Mr. Macron kept in contact with Mr. Putin. However, his emphasis on the need for Russian security and the avoidance of the humiliation of Russia criticized many European colleagues and Ukrainians, who saw it as naive and excessively sensitive to the attacker.

Ukrainian troops converted “Macron” into a Ukrainian verb, which means a lot of conversation. And while Mr. Zelensky France thanked for humanitarian and diplomatic support, he and other Ukrainian officials from the Ukrainian officials said frustrated about the slow pace of French arms deliveries.

This time was a small point in the relationship between Mr. Zelensky and Mr. Macron, said Rym Mommer, an expert in French foreign policy at the Carnegie Foundation for International Peace, who regularly traveled with Mr. Macron for a book that she writes about the changing world order.

Then, four months after war, Mr. Macron went to Kyiv and visited the broken suburb of Irpin.

“That was the moment I changed her relationship,” said Ms. Loiseau.

He came out of a long one -to -one conversation with Mr. Zelensky, she said. “Macron said to me:” We are as happy to have someone like him, “she said.” We can work with him. We have to bet on him. It’s worth it. “

Mr. Macron stopped talking to Mr. Putin after Ukrainian soldiers freed Bucha and discovered the massacre there. In an interview with the newspaper Le Figaro in early 2023, Mr. Zelensky said about Mr. Macron: “I think he changed. And this time he really changed.”

In May 2023, Macron said in a speech in Bratislava, Slovakia that he had not listened to many years of warnings from Eastern European countries about Russia’s expansion goals, and asked western countries to offer Ukraine security guarantees. Many analysts regarded this as a big change in the politics of the French President, close the door to Russia and placed its full weight in the defense of Ukraine.

“Since then, the relationship with Zelensky has improved and deepened,” said Ms. Mommer.

Some of the people surveyed who are close to the French President stated that France Kyiv had no longer delivered military equipment or direct help. But they believe that Mr. Macron has demonstrated his value for Mr. Zelensky by bringing the Ukrainian guide together with other leaders-intalled by Mr. Trump, who had just secured a re-election in the office, in December when the emergency and damatic and cathedral and by introducing taboo concepts in combating the war.

For example, at a meeting in Paris about the war, Mr. Macron has the idea that Europe brought troops to Ukraine to secure a ceasefire. The pushback was almost unanimous at that time. Now, more than a year later, detailed discussions about the make -up and the support of this force are continued.

“Macron’s utility for Zelensky is not that he is just a buddy who sympathizes with him and what he can do to help. We are in a war, we are not in an emotional relationship,” said Catherine Colonna, another former French Foreign Minister. “France helps, but it also serves a lot to put ideas on the table, close the violation and pave the way.”

Since Mr. Trump’s return to power in Washington, Mr. Macron has proven to be an important channel and translator between the American president and Mr. Zelensky.

After Mr. Zelensky’s catastrophic February visit in the White House talked to the two managers by phone and sewed in a nearby consultant of both men.

“Macron uses his ability to get a hearing from Trump to improve Zelensky’s position,” said Ms. Malt.

In the past few months, the pace and the content of conversations between Mr. Zelensky and Mr. Macron have changed, said two diplomats near Mr. Macron, which insisted on anonymity in harmony with French political practice. Instead of military supplies, they are now discussing the Wease-Fire-Plans-Sowohl on the battlefield as well as with the White House.

According to Ms. Rufo, Mr. Macron is regularly informed about the intimate movements of the war, and in calls with Mr. Zelensky, he discusses the battlefield in detail – except for the names of cities and villages at the forefront.

“Emmanuel is a war expert,” Zelensky told Bernard-Henri Lévy, a French intellectual who knows both managers, in a recent interview for a new documentary about Ukraine “Our War”, the next month is published by Cohen Media Group in the USA next month.

Mr. Lévy, who filmed the leaders between the leaders for his documentary, said he had seen a “brotherhood, a brotherhood of soul and weapons” between them.

For Mr. Zelensky, he said, “became more than an ally – I think he has become a friend.”