French President Emmanuel Macron, who was speaking to the Brussels press on Tuesday 2 July, defended the free trade agreement concluded with Mercosur three days earlier (see EUROPE B12286A3).
Recalling that protectionism is not in France's DNA, he considered that this new treaty was the result of an “openness without naivety”.
Any negotiation implies a degree of reciprocity: while it leads, among other things, to compromises in terms of agricultural openness, Mr Macron stressed France's...