France will send troops and defence systems to Saudi Arabia to help protect the Red Sea port city of Yanbu, a key site for energy transport, French President Emmanuel Macron said on Thursday.
Macron also said a U.S. ban on diesel exports, which the White House has denied is under consideration, would be “catastrophic” for the global economy and the United States.
Speaking in a wide-ranging primetime television interview about international affairs, Macron also warned of possible Russian attacks on French soil.
Facing growing pressure at home over high energy prices, Macron sought to reassure the French public that the country had adequate gas and oil supplies as winter approaches. He said Paris was working to ensure energy flows were not disrupted.
Crude oil prices have risen recently as the main alternative route for Saudi oil exports through Yanbu has come under missile attacks from Yemen’s Iran-backed Houthis.
“We are going to send military resources, that is to say, soldiers, radar systems and defence systems, to protect this site, not to get us involved in any conflicts, but to protect this site,” Macron told TF1 and France 2 television.
Macron dismissed a report by Spanish newspaper El Mundo that the U.S. Central Intelligence Agency had warned European governments about possible drone attacks from the Mediterranean.
“I can deny it. The CIA did not inform French services,” he said.
However, Macron said Russia was carrying out increasingly hostile and criminal acts against European countries and that France could face strikes similar to a failed attack in Leipzig.
Germany has said Russia was responsible for an attempted drone attack on Leipzig airport in August.
Macron gathered French party leaders at the Élysée Palace last week to brief them on what he described as a growing threat from Russia. He later said he had ordered his government to draw up a plan to protect critical infrastructure from drone and cyber attacks.
Macron said Moscow was seeking to intimidate Europe and weaken its resolve to support Ukraine.
Russia has rejected European allegations of hybrid attacks, calling them baseless and the result of what it describes as anti-Russian hysteria.
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