MUNICH >> President Emmanuel Macron of France on Friday called for an “intensification” of Western support for Ukraine, but, unlike other leaders addressing the Munich Security Conference, he also underscored that peace negotiations were the ultimate goal. Macron declared that the “neocolonialist and imperialist” aggression against Ukraine unleashed by President Vladimir Putin of Russia “must fail,” calling Russia’s war “catastrophic and unjustified.”

At the same time, he used words including “dialogue” and “reengagement” to describe an eventual interaction with Russia in the future, terms that Olaf Scholz, the German chancellor, avoided in a speech immediately before Macron that was uniformly resolute and offered no prediction of an end to the year-old war.

“Now the question is how to resist? How to help the Ukrainians to make on the ground something which will force Russia to come back to the table on the conditions of Ukraine,” Macron said in English, answering questions after a speech delivered in French. Macron told the audience that “none of us will change geography” that places Russia “on European soil.” Given that, “we will have to negotiate,” he said. The goal of such a negotiation, he said in response to questions, would have to be “an imperfect balance” that preserves “something sustainable for Russia itself.”