For the first time since 27 February, Emmanuel Macron will make the move official. The president of the Republic will be celebrating in London on the 80th anniversary of the appeal of June 18 was launched by general de Gaulle, announced Friday the services of the princes Charles. It will cross the English Channel after having assisted at the morning traditional ceremony at the memorial of Mont-Valérien, near paris.
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This is the first trip of the French president since that of the 27th of February to Naples for a top Italian-French, and therefore since the introduction of containment in France due to the pandemic of the novel coronavirus. Emmanuel Macron has since remained in France because of the crisis of the coronavirus, all of the international meetings held by video conferencing.
Not quarantine
The head of State and his delegation will escape, however, the quarantine imposed on travellers entering the United Kingdom in accordance with the exemptions provided by the british government, according to a spokesperson of Downing Street. The presidential couple from france will be received at Clarence House, the residence of prince Charles and his wife.
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This visit will take place as London and Brussels are planning to intensify their discussions to try to find an agreement on the relationship post-Brexit between the United Kingdom and the european Union after the end of the transition period which will end on 31 December and that the government of Boris Johnson has formally refused to extend a Friday.
Legion of honor for the city of London
Emmanuel Macron will present the Legion of honor to the city of London, which will become the seventh city to be thus decorated after Algiers, Belgrade, Brazzaville, Liège, Luxembourg and Volgograd, primarily for the role they played in the world wars. This displacement is, for him, the second event in the framework of the “year de Gaulle” after the celebration, on 17 may, the 80th anniversary of the battle of Montcornet (Aisne), where he was hailed ” the spirit of resistance to French “, before a visit announced to Colombey-les-deux-Churches (Haute-Marne), where is buried the General, on the occasion of the 50th anniversary of his death, November 9, 1970.
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In the message broadcast by the BBC on 18 June 1940, the day after his arrival in London, general de Gaulle had called on the military, engineers, and French workers to join him to continue the fight against nazi Germany, despite the wishes of the government of marshal Pétain concluded an armistice. “Whatever happens, the flame of French resistance must not be extinguished and will not shut down,” said the General, in concluding his intervention.
