Sergio Mattarella is in Paris for the first international visit after the coronavirus emergency. He was met by the Minister for Europe and Foreign Affairs, Jean-Yves Le Drian, before going to the Muse’e National de la Ce’ramique de Se’vres accompanied by the Minister of Ecological Transition Barbara Pompili.
A diplomatic taste in view of what will be the highlight day, tomorrow, when the President of the Republic will be welcomed at the Hotel des Invalides by a welcome ceremony that includes military honors, an Italian flag along the way to the Elysée and an official escort of 120 French cuirassiers on motorcycles and on horseback. The scheduled meeting will be at the presidential palace with Emmanuel Macron, who started the last year of his presidency and is running for a reconfirmation in April 2022. At the center of the conversation is the strengthening of cooperation between Italy and France, both bilaterally that as a solid basis for the new hoped-for path of the Union that starts from the new course inaugurated with the approval of the Next Generation EU. With a view to strengthening the increasingly solidarity cooperation in the various challenges that the European Union must face, taking advantage of the US administration’s return to multilateralism.
A vision that coincides perfectly with that of the Head of State: «The enduring vitality of transatlantic ties, reinvigorated by his recent visit to Europe – wrote Mattarella to Biden for Independence day – deserves to be constantly nurtured and supported. Italy adheres with conviction to this task, in the awareness that the United States and the European Union are called to work ever more closely together and in the many areas of common interest ». A more united and compact Europe, therefore, to better face global challenges and to relaunch a transatlantic dialogue that asks to speak with a united voice: these are the guidelines that the Head of State, comforted by the sharing of the government and beyond beyond any variations of the single majority parties, he will share tomorrow with Macron.