In an effort to build a partnership that Paris views as an alternative to great power conflicts, Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi and French President Emmanuel Macron travelled to southern France on Wednesday with a full program.
Prior to Wednesday’s trip to the Mediterranean coast and Marseille, France’s second-largest city, Macron took Modi out to dinner on Tuesday in the charming southern town of Cassis. At the Mazargues military cemetery south of Marseille, they started the day with a memorial service for Indian troops who lost their lives in France during World War I. A modest group of applauding Indians attended the opening of India’s new consulate general in Marseille.
After that, it was time for business, including a visit to the international sea freight firm CMA CGM. The two leaders have been talking about the India-Middle East-Europe Economic route (IMEC), a project that will compete with China’s Belt and Road Initiative by building a maritime and rail route across the Middle East connecting India and Europe.
Macron stated, “We see the relevance of IMEC projet,” while on the tour. “Marseille can be clearly the entry point for the whole European market.” Macron had already hailed IMEC as a “fabulous catalyst” for “concrete projects and investment” at the conclusion of a French-Indian business meeting. Paris also intends to sell India’s navy Scorpene-class submarines and Rafale combat planes valued billions of dollars. In the field of nuclear energy, Macron also hopes to expand collaboration with India, particularly in the construction of small modular reactors (SMRs).
Acting as a bridge
A visit to the experimental nuclear fusion laboratory ITER, a global initiative focused on next-generation energy generation, was on Wednesday’s agenda. Modi has already travelled to France for high-profile occasions, such as the 2023 Bastille Day celebration and this week’s French-hosted artificial intelligence (AI) meeting. The friendship with India’s PM is part of France’s ambition to find an alternative to the US-China superpower competition, Macron said over the weekend.
“India and France are two great powers who are very closely aligned in our desire to work with the United States of America, and to work with China, but we don’t want to be dependent on anybody,” Macron stated on French television. “We want to be independent.” Because “Modi, who is leading an emerging power, has found a balanced position between the Americans, the Chinese, and the Russians,” a former French government minister, who wished to remain anonymous, told AFP that Macron had “the right intuition.” “The idea of acting as a bridge between the north and the south is a constant in France’s rhetoric,” noted Bertrand Badie, a sciences-Po university expert in international relations. However, this compels Macron to remain mute on “the internal policies” that Modi was pursuing,” he stated. Later Wednesday, Modi is expected to take a plane to Washington, where he will meet with US President Donald Trump.
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