Macron Visits Netherlands Amid Row Over China Comments

Faizan Hashmi Published April 11, 2023 | 03:10 PM

Amsterdam, (UrduPoint / Pakistan Point News - 11th Apr, 2023 ) :French President Emmanuel Macron began a state visit to the Netherlands on Tuesday to give a speech on European sovereignty.

Making the first state visit by a French president to the Netherlands for 23 years, Macron and his wife Brigitte were greeted by Dutch King Willem-Alexander and Queen Maxima on their arrival in Amsterdam.

The French leader stood to attention alongside the Dutch royals outside the Royal Palace as a band played the Marseillaise, the French national anthem. A few people cheered as Macron's car arrived, an AFP journalist said.

But amid the pomp and ceremony, all eyes are on Macron's comments on China, which he visited last week.

The Elysee Palace insisted Tuesday that the president had never called for Europe to keep an "equidistance" from the United States and China.

Macron is due to make a speech in English on "European sovereignty" in security and economic matters on Tuesday afternoon at the Dutch Nexus Institute in The Hague.

The speech comes after he said in an interview with media including French business daily Les Echos and Politico that "we don't want to depend on others on critical issues", citing energy, artificial intelligence and social networks.

During the two-day Dutch state visit, Macron will have a state dinner with the king and queen, see the hot-ticket Johannes Vermeer exhibition at the Rijksmuseum in Amsterdam, and meet Prime Minister Mark Rutte on a canal boat.

The visit is meant to highlight a new dynamic between Paris and The Hague after the turning point of Brexit.

In the wake of the speech, Paris and The Hague will sign a "pact for innovation" on Wednesday focusing on cooperation in semiconductors, quantum physics and energy.

France and the Netherlands will also work to finalise a defence pact by 2024.

The French president's domestic political troubles also threaten to intrude on the visit, with a new day of strikes against his pension reform plans planned for Thursday.