I STOPPED TRUMP PULLING TROOPS OUT, SAYS MACRON

EMMANUEL Macron last night claimed he had convinced Donald Trump not to pull US troops out of Syria.

The French president said he had also ‘persuaded’ his US counterpart ‘that we needed to limit the strikes to chemical weapons [sites]’.

‘Ten days ago, President Trump was saying the United States of America had a duty to disengage from Syria,’ he told French news channel BFM TV.

‘We convinced him it was necessary to stay. I assure you, we have convinced him that it is necessary to stay for the long-term.’

During the two hour interview, Mr Macron said the air strikes – which he described as a military success – were not a ‘declaration of war on the regime of Bashar al-Assad’.

Mr Trump called Mr Macron twice before he shared his intention to strike Syria in a Twitter post. But he failed to call Theresa May in the early stages of the situation.

The military action gave Mr Macron a chance to promote France as the leading US ally in Europe.

A French diplomatic source told the Sunday Telegraph: ‘Macron is positioning France as America’s most effective European ally while Angela Merkel is absorbed by domestic politics and Britain is preoccupied with Brexit.’