Emmanuel Macron kept at distance from Putin after refusing COVID test

Russia claimed on Friday that French President Emmanuel Macron was forced to sit at an incredibly long table for his talks with Russian President Vladimir Putin because he refused to undergo a COVID test administered by the Kremlin.

When Macron arrived in Moscow on Monday with a mission to calm fears of a Russian invasion of Ukraine, the two presidents sat at opposite ends of an unusually long table in the Kremlin.

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The table garnered a lot of mockery online, and it raised even more eyebrows three days later when Putin sat at a little table with Kazakhstan’s president, a close ally.

Dmitry Peksov, a spokesperson for Putin, claimed the decision to submit Macron to the massive table was made after he refused to take a Covid test administered by Kremlin medics.

“Talks with some are being held at a long table, the distance (across the table) is about six meters,” Peskov said.

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“It is linked to the fact that some follow their own rules, they don’t cooperate with the host side,” he said.

In such instances, he said, the Kremlin must follow “additional sanitary protocol on protecting our president’s and his guests’ health.”

He stated that who is put to the long table is not a political decision.

“There is no politics here and this in no way interferes with negotiations,” Peskov said.

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“Putin communicates with his guests directly, sitting very close and shaking hands,” he noted, if medics from both sides of diplomatic encounters collaborate.

Macron “did everything as he had to as always when he travels,” according to a source in Macron’s entourage.

Without getting into specifics, a French presidential official who did not want to be identified revealed that the problem stemmed from the Russian side’s PCR test requirements.

When Viktor Orban, the Prime Minister of Hungary, and Ebrahim Raisi, the President of Iran, visited earlier this year, they were forced to sit at a distance from Putin.

In the Kremlin, Putin and Orban also drank champagne while standing at opposite ends of a big carpet.

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The Kremlin has gone to great measures to keep COVID from infecting 69-year-old Putin, who is inoculated with Russia’s own Sputnik V vaccine.

While there has been a lack of social distance in many parts of Moscow, the long-serving Russian leader has been extremely cautious with Covid.

Foreigners travelling to Russia are required to undergo a PCR test before flying to the country, but they are not needed to take one once they arrive.