France's Barrot says Russia is attacking the whole of Europe
The remark comes the same day Marco Rubio met Sergei Lavrov in New York to discuss a possible ceasefire.
Published
France's Foreign Minister Jean-Noël Barrot said Russia is attacking the whole of Europe, not just Ukraine.
The comment lands on a day of heavy diplomatic activity. Rubio met Lavrov in New York at 9am Eastern, and afterward said both Russia and Ukraine want a ceasefire covering grain and energy targets. The Kremlin has separately cautioned that broader peace talks are not yet ready.
The diplomatic track sits alongside sharper warnings from both sides of the war. Ukraine's president, Volodymyr Zelensky, has said Russia is preparing a large-scale attack on his country. Russia's president, Vladimir Putin, told servicemen that Moscow's military goals in Ukraine will be achieved. France's president, Emmanuel Macron, has called for a double moratorium: a halt to strikes on energy infrastructure and on Black Sea grain shipments.
Barrot's framing of a continent-wide threat cuts against that diplomatic push. It comes as Rubio, Macron and others are working active channels toward a ceasefire, and a statement that casts Russia as attacking all of Europe pulls in the opposite direction, hardening European positions at the moment those channels are opening and making a near-term settlement less likely.