Emmanuel Macron at the Elysée, in Paris, on February 9, 2026. KAMIL ZIHNIOGLU FOR LE MONDE
The honeymoon between Paris and Berlin has proven brief. Nearly a year after the February 23, 2025, German parliamentary elections brought conservative Chancellor Friedrich Merz to power, the atmosphere in both countries has come to resemble the one that prevailed under Merz’s predecessor, the Social Democrat Olaf Scholz, who was in office from 2021 to 2025. Due to the lack of any real rapport between Scholz and French President Emmanuel Macron, French-German relations had become frosty at the time. Despite the hopes raised by the election of Merz, who was touted as being committed to Europe and knowledgeable about French-German relations, behind the two leaders’ repeated displays of friendship for the cameras, France and Germany have stopped hiding their disagreements on key issues.
The interview that Macron granted to several European newspapers, including Le Monde, on Tuesday, February 10, just two days ahead of an informal European summit and three days before the Munich Security Conference, was received with reservations in Berlin, and even a hint of irritation. In the interview, Macron once again raised issues that have long divided France and Germany, such as a common European Union loan, protectionism and even European preference in goods purchases. “Macron also implicitly criticizes Germany’s strategic choices, whether on energy, the security guaranteed by the United States or depending on China as an export market,” said Stefan Seidendorf, deputy director of the French-German Institute.
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