LUDOVIC MARIN / AFP
Emmanuel Macron and Xi Jinping before the State dinner at the Élysée on May 6, 2024.
POLITICS – Holidays in the mountains… or almost. Chinese President Xi Jinping, currently on a state visit to France, and President Emmanuel Macron are traveling to the Hautes-Pyrénées this Tuesday, May 7. And there is a very particular reason.
If Monday was devoted to economic and international subjects then to a dinner at the Elysée in the presence of numerous personalities, the tone will be much more personal with this trip to the southwest of France, a place of childhood memories for Emmanuel Macron. It will also be the seventh anniversary of his first election.
The two heads of state are due to meet at Tarbes-Lourdes airport late in the morning. From there, the two leaders will go to the Col du Tourmalet, well known to cycling enthusiasts for regularly appearing on the Tour de France program, and which this time will serve as the setting for a lunch between the two leaders. They will eat at L’Étape du Berger, a restaurant run by breeder Eric Abadie, around 1 p.m., specifies the local daily The Republic of the Pyrenees.
A place that is not chosen at random
The same Source details the menu: lamb shoulder, black pork ham and Tarbais beans, selection of cheeses from the best worker in France Dominique Bouchait, and blueberry tart. To accompany the meal, local wines will be offered to the two heads of state and their spouses.
The chosen location is no coincidence. Eric Abadie met Emmanuel Macron when he was still a child and came to ski on the neighboring slopes of La Mongie. He became a friend of the president. It is also near the station, in the town of Montgaillard, that the tomb of the French president’s grandmother is located.
With this visit to the region, the Élysée intends to replicate the sequence offered during Emmanuel Macron’s visit to China last year. The head of state was then invited by Xi Jinping to Canton for the tea ceremony, a trip with strong personal symbolism for the Chinese leader since his father held political responsibilities there before being removed from power.
“Anchor the Franco-Chinese relationship in a territory”
“In continuation of your stop in Lyon in 2014, of our exchanges in the Kérylos villa in Beaulieu-sur-Mer near Nice in 2019, we will continue to anchor each strong moment of the Franco-Chinese relationship in a territory “, Emmanuel Macron himself explained during a press conference on Monday.
“The same thing we did in China, I had the opportunity to visit Canton in 2023 and I would like to thank you again for your welcome and the long discussions we had”added the head of state in the direction of Xi Jinping, whose visit coincides with the 60th anniversary of the establishment of diplomatic relations between the two countries. “Our French mountains”, “I hope will continue to inspire us”he said again.
Xi Jinping’s journey will conclude in the afternoon, again at Tarbes-Lourdes airport, from where the Chinese president will fly off for two new European stops. Meetings with a very different tone since he is expected in Serbia and Hungary, a fervent ally of Russia and the ugly duckling of the EU, led by the authoritarian Viktor Orban.
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