Emmanuel Macron on Wednesday displayed a certain complicity with Italian President Sergio Mattarella, during a visit to Paris that could be followed, by the end of June, by the arrival of Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni, with whom relations have so far been more turbulent.
On the day of its inauguration, the French head of state and his counterpart visited the exhibition "Naples in Paris" at the Louvre Museum, which mixed masterpieces of the Italian Renaissance with paintings loaned by the Neapolitan Capodimonte Museum.
"Historical" links
In front of Leonardo da Vinci's "Mona Lisa", or Caravaggio's "The Flagellation", presented to the two presidents as "Capodimonte's Mona Lisa", Emmanuel Macron and Sergio Mattarella admired this installation which, according to the Elysee, "honors the historical links between France and Italy".
The French presidency insisted on the "relationship of trust and friendship" between the two men, but also, beyond that, the "exceptional ties that unite" the two countries. These ties have gone through some turbulence, especially around the thorny issue of immigration, since the ultraconservative government led by Giorgia Meloni, herself at the head of a far-right party, came to power in Rome in the autumn.
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While the France has assured to have invited the head of the Italian government for months, no date has been set, but a visit is now evoked by the end of the month, perhaps around the summit for a new international financial pact organized by Emmanuel Macron on June 22 and 23. In the meantime, the visit of the Italian president, who plays in Rome a constitutional role of wise man and guarantor of the institutions, seemed likely to demonstrate the stability of relations between the two neighbors, beyond the identity of their leaders.
In front of young diplomats Tuesday evening in Paris, Sergio Mattarella quoted remarks made in July 1943 by General de Gaulle. Just after "the fall of fascism" in Italy, when it was a "tormented period", he recalled, "De Gaulle evoked a 'close neighbourhood' and an 'interdependence of the two great Latin peoples'". "Relations between Italy and France are, as we all know, centuries-old. Your task will be to continue to feed them," the Italian president told the young diplomats.
