Skip to content

Subscriber Only

Lionel Laurent

Emmanuel Macron Is Happy to Fight With Italy

The French president is trying to use the spat to take back the initiative from the gilets jaunes and get his economic reforms back on track.

France recalling its Italian ambassador is unprecedented, but there's an advantage to be gained. — France recalling its Italian ambassador is unprecedented, but there's an advantage to be gained.
Photographer: Ludovic Marin/AFP/Getty Images

By

February 8, 2019, 8:07 AM UTC

Emmanuel Macron has followed the old adage: Never waste a good crisis.

As relations with Italy go from bad to toxic, the French president has taken the unprecedented step of recalling his ambassador from Italy — the kind of diplomatic spat that doesn’t usually happen between big EU member states. It’s calculated to embarrass Luigi Di Maio, Italy’s deputy prime minister and leader of the anti-establishment Five Star Movement, who brazenly met with the gilets jaunes protesters on French soil.