Marie Toussaint condemns “the naivety of European leaders over the last twenty years”

“We could have, we should have avoided both the annexation of Crimea, but also the invasion of Ukraine. And today, we absolutely must act,” says the head of the Environmentalists list. to Europeans.

“I am satisfied that Russia is not invited” at the ceremonies of the 80th anniversary of the Allied Landings in Normandy, declared Thursday June 6 on franceinfo the head of the list of Ecologists to Europeans Marie Toussaint.

American Presidents Joe Biden, French Emmanuel Macron, Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau and German Chancellor Olaf Scholz meet Thursday on Omaha beach, near Bayeux (Calvados), among around twenty other heads of state among including the Ukrainian Volodymyr Zelensky.

“We need to support Ukraine, we need to send all the messages in this direction and so it is rather good news that Russia is not there”underlined Marie Toussaint, who sees in these commemorations a symbol which aims “to defend peace and to salute the capacity that Europe had on its territory, when we thought peace was impossible, to rebuild it and maintain it for more than 70 years. We must continue to support Ukraine, but also our democracies and therefore peace on the European project. It is normal that she [la Russie] don’t be around the table”she developed.

Excluded from the celebrations of the 80th anniversary of the Landing, having become a pariah on the international scene, in 2014, Russia was nevertheless present during the 70th anniversary. At the initiative of French President François Hollande, President Vladimir Putin responded alongside his Ukrainian counterpart Petro Poroshenko, despite the annexation of Crimea three months earlier, in the name of the search for peace. “Maybe it was a mistakeestimated Marie Toussaint. And we saw the naivety during not the ten, but in reality the last twenty years which was that of European leaders, even if they were left-wing.” “We could have, we should have avoided both the annexation of Crimea, but also the invasion of Ukraine. And today, we absolutely must act.” she repeated. “I see Emmanuel Macron making publicity stunts. I hope it won’t just be empty publicity stunts,” she said, calling on Emmanuel Macron to “hit Putin in the wallet”.

Asked about the potential sending of French instructors to Ukrainian soil, the head of the Green list is not against it. “We must stand alongside Ukraine and if that means sending instructors, why not. I would like that in this case, it would no longer be a European decision rather than a French decision.” she clarified.