By Elizabeth Pineau, Ingrid Melander and John Irish
PARIS (Reuters) – French far-right presidential candidate Marine Le Pen said on Wednesday that once the Russia-Ukraine war was over, she would propose closer links between NATO and Russia as she sought to clear up “misunderstandings” over her foreign policy.
A Le Pen victory in France’s presidential election runoff on April 24 would reverberate through Europe and across the Atlantic, installing a deep eurosceptic in the Elysee Palace and someone who had long professed admiration for Russian President Vladimir Putin.
“As soon as the Russian-Ukrainian war is over and has been settled by a peace treaty, I will call for the implementation of a strategic rapprochement between NATO and Russia,” Le Pen told a news conference packed with international reporters.
Five years ago, before she faced Emmanuel Macron in the 2017 presidential election runoff which she lost heavily, Putin hosted Le Pen at the Kremlin with open arms.
At the time, she declared admiringly that she shared the same values as Putin and that a “new world order” was emerging with him, then-U.S. President Donald Trump and her at the helm.
Le Pen has changed tack on Russia since the war in Ukraine and said she was “independent” of any foreign nation.
Wednesday’s news conference was briefly interrupted when a protester brandished a picture of the 2017 encounter with Putin, cut out in the shape of a heart. The protester was taken out of the room by security.
Le Pen also said she wanted to keep a close relationship with Germany, but warned that there were strategic differences between the two, which would mean putting an end to a series of Franco-German joint military programmes.
“I would continue … reconciliation without following the Macron-Merkel model of French blindness towards Berlin,” she said.
She said she wanted a looser version of the European Union, although reaffirmed that she would remain in the bloc. Le Pen has dropped past unpopular proposals to ditch the euro or leave the EU.
“Nobody is against Europe,” she said. “I would not stop paying France’s contribution to the EU, I want to diminish it.”
Le Pen came second behind Macron in the first round and polling firms put her closely behind Macron for the second round on April 24.
