PARIS: French President Macron said on Thursday France and, he hoped, the European Union, would neither be a vassal of China nor be totally aligned with the US in matters of defence in the Indo-Pacific region.
“Our approach in terms of Indo-Pacific strategy is not to align with anybody,” he told a news conference ahead of the G7 summit.
The meeting, starting on Friday, will see the presence of nations that are not formal G7 members: India, South Korea, Australia and South Africa.
The guest nations are in the Indo Pacific region, making them central to Western efforts to grapple with Beijing’s growing economic might and territorial ambition.