Blinken meets Macron as US seeks to heal rift with France

PARIS (AP) — French President Emmanuel Macron and U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken met Tuesday to explore potential cooperation in the Indo-Pacific and other areas as the Biden administration moved to repair damage caused to relations by excluding France from a new security initiative.

A senior U.S. State Department official said the two discussed possible joint projects that could be announced by Macron and President Joe Biden when they meet later this month in Europe at a date and specific venue that has yet to be decided.

The official didn't elaborate on what those projects might be, but said they would likely involve the Indo-Pacific and Western efforts to blunt China's growing there and elsewhere, NATO and other trans-Atlantic objectives involving the European Union, and counterterrorism cooperation in Africa's Sahel region.

The official said Macron and Blinken had agreed to use the spat as an opportunity to “deepen and strengthen coordination” and characterized the talks as “very productive," while allowing that “a lot of hard work remains ahead.”

The official spoke to reporters on condition of anonymity to discuss the closed-door talks between Macron and Blinken at the Elysee Palace that hadn't appeared on Blinken's official schedule for the day.

The roughly 40-minute, one-on-one meeting came amid French demands for the U.S. to restore trust that was ruptured with last month’s announcement of a three-way Indo-Pacific agreement between Australia, Britain and the U.S., known as AUKUS.

A French official, speaking under customary anonymity, said the “at length, face-to-face meeting” came immediately after Blinken had seen Macron's national security adviser Emmanuel Bonne. Bonne, the official said, saw Blinken “in order to study the ways of reengaging the...