French President Emmanuel Macron said in an interview that Western ground operations in Ukraine may be necessary "at some point", days after meeting the leaders of Germany and Poland.
Last month, Macron refused to rule out the possibility of deploying ground troops in Ukraine, prompting a sharp response from Berlin and other European partners.
However, the French president did not give up his position, but emphasized that the Western allies would not take the initiative.
"Maybe at some point - I don't want to, I won't take the initiative - we will have to conduct operations on the ground, whatever they are, to counter the Russian forces," Macron told Le Parisien newspaper in an interview.
"The strength of France is that we can cope".
Disagreements over the possibility of ground operations and the supply of long-range missiles to Kiev threatened to undermine cooperation between the allies.
German Chancellor Olaf Scholz reacted angrily to Macron's earlier refusal to rule out sending troops to Ukraine and his sharp comments urging allies not to be "cowards".
On Friday, Macron met his German and Polish counterparts in Berlin in a show of solidarity with Kiev.
After the meeting, Macron stated that the three countries of the so-called Weimar Triangle are "united" in their goal "to never allow Russia to win and to support the Ukrainian people to the end." /BGNES
