The meeting of the French and German governments, scheduled for next week, was postponed to January due to the participants' busy schedules rather than political disagreements, French Finance Minister Bruno Le Maire said on Wednesday
MOSCOW (Pakistan Point News / Sputnik - 19th October, 2022) The meeting of the French and German governments, scheduled for next week, was postponed to January due to the participants' busy schedules rather than political disagreements, French Finance Minister Bruno Le Maire said on Wednesday.
"The postponement (of the meeting) is linked only to difficulties with some ministers' diaries but has nothing to do with any kind of political difficulties it is only linked to diary complexities," the minister said at a joint press conference with German Economy Minister Robert Habeck and German Finance Minister Christian Lindner.
Earlier in the day, Politico reported a possible postponement of the meeting due to concerns about the lack of progress in areas of cooperation such as energy and defense, including joint projects such as the Future Combat Air System (FCAS) fighter jet and the Main Ground Combat System (MGCS) tank.
A French government official told the newspaper that energy and defense cooperation between Paris and Berlin had been stalled, particularly on the joint project.
The report added that two German officials had confirmed that negotiations on the text of a joint declaration were ongoing but said that they had no information on a possible postponement of the ministerial council next week.
French President Emmanuel Macron and German Chancellor Olaf Scholz, together with their cabinets, were scheduled to meet in the French town of Fontainebleau next week at the annual Franco-German Council of Ministers the first such meeting since Scholz's coalition came to power in Germany.
