Arthur de Laborde, edited by Laura Laplaud / Photo credit: Andreas SOLARO / AFP
The head of the Italian government Giorgia Meloni will be received this Tuesday at the Elysée Palace by Emmanuel Macron as part of Rome’s bid for the 2030 World Expo. The two leaders will try to improve their relations after several months of crisis, particularly related to migration issues.
Several times postponed, the meeting between Emmanuel Macron and Giorgia Meloni will finally take place this Tuesday in Paris. The President will receive the President of the Italian Council at the Élysée in the afternoon. The two leaders, who do not like each other, will try to improve their relations after several months of crises, particularly related to migration issues.
“Giorgia Meloni will not become a political friend of Emmanuel Macron”
There is a common agenda and a convergence of priorities between Paris and Rome, particularly on Ukraine, but “Giorgia Meloni will not become a political friend of Emmanuel Macron”, summarizes a diplomat. “The current never passed between the two leaders.”
A few days after Giorgia Meloni came to power this fall, the crisis on the Ocean Viking migrant ship suddenly strained relations.
Since then, nothing has really improved. Last month, Interior Minister Gérald Darmanin again sparked a diplomatic quarrel by considering the nationalist leader “unable to resolve the migratory problems on which she was elected”. Statements considered particularly unwelcome by Rome when more than 55,000 people have landed illegally in Italy since the beginning of the year.
Difficult to imagine a real agreement between the two leaders
Paradoxically, on the immigration file, some of Giorgia Meloni’s proposals such as the creation of hotspots or the reduction of NGOs’ intervention capacities at sea have already been defended by Emmanuel Macron. But difficult to imagine a real agreement on the subject a few months before the campaign for the European elections.