French President Emmanuel Macron has arrived in Britain for a state visit mixing royal pageantry with thorny political talks about stopping migrants from crossing the English Channel in small boats.
Macron and British Prime Minister Keir Starmer will also try to advance plans for a post-ceasefire security force for Ukraine, despite apparent US indifference to the idea and Russia’s refusal to halt the onslaught on its neighbour.
The president and his wife, Brigitte Macron, were greeted on Tuesday (local time) on a red carpet at London’s RAF Northolt air base by the Prince and Princess of Wales.
They were met in Windsor, west of London, by the King and Queen.
There was an awkward moment when Macron was left hanging by his wife Brigitte when he extended his hand to help her down the plane stairs.
This was after Brigitte was caught on camera pushing Macron in the face as they prepared to exit their plane in Vietnam in May.
Macron’s three-day visit, at the invitation of the King, is the first state visit to Britain by a European Union head of state since Brexit, and a symbol of the Starmer government’s desire to reset relations with the bloc the UK acrimoniously left in 2020.
The Macrons were greeted at London’s RAF Northolt air base by Prince William and his wife Catherine — wearing a dress by French design house Christian Dior. The Waleses accompanied the Macrons to meet the King and Queen at Windsor, west of London.
They were driven to the almost 1000-year-old royal residence of Windsor Castle in horse-drawn carriages, through streets bedecked in Union Jacks and French tricolour flags.
The King and Queen hosted a banquet for the Macrons at Windsor Castle on Tuesday night. Among the 160 guests were politicians, diplomats and celebrities such as Sir Mick Jagger and Sir Elton John.
They were served summer vegetables, chicken with asparagus and iced blackcurrant parfait, along with champagne and a gin-infused cocktail called L’entente, after the “entente cordiale” struck between Britain and France in 1904.
Macron addressed both houses of Britain’s parliament before sitting down for talks with Starmer on migration, defence and investment.
He said France and the UK had to work together to tackle the problem of illegal migration.
Macron said hope for a better life was “legitimate”, but the countries could not allow people and criminals to “flout” the rules.
He said the priority was to fix the “burden for our two countries”.
At a Britain-France summit on Thursday, senior government officials from the two countries will discuss small-boat crossings, a thorny issue for successive governments on both sides of the English Channel.
Britain receives fewer asylum-seekers than Mediterranean European countries. But thousands of migrants each year use northern France as a launching point to reach the UK, either by stowing away in trucks or — after a clampdown on that route — in small boats across one of the world’s busiest shipping lanes.
Starmer, whose centre-left government was elected a year ago, has pledged to ” smash the gangs ” behind organised people-smuggling.
As monarch, the King is expected to be above politics, but he spoke about the support Britain and France give Ukraine “in defence of our shared values”, noted the challenge of “irregular migration across the English Channel”. He said both nations faced “complex threats, emanating from multiple directions”.
“As friends and as allies, we face them together,” he said.
The British royals made a state visit to France in September 2023.
Starmer and Macron have worked closely to rally support for Ukraine, with Britain and France leading efforts to form an international peacekeeping force for Ukraine to reinforce a future ceasefire with European troops and equipment and US security guarantees.
US President Donald Trump has shown little enthusiasm for the idea, however, and a ceasefire remains elusive.
-with AAP
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