U.S. President Joe Biden met his French counterpart Emmanuel Macron in Rome ahead of the G20 summit on Friday to mend relations following the Australian submarine crisis.
"What we did was clumsy," Biden told Macron at a joint press conference, calling France a "highly valued partner."
Biden affirmed that he was under the impression that France had already been informed that their deal with Australia was not going through.
Moreover, he stressed that the United States does not have an older and more loyal ally than France and that there is no place in the world where the United States cannot cooperate with France.
On his part, Macron hailed "concrete decisions from Washington," marking the start of a "trust process" between France and the United States.
The meeting at the French embassy is their first in-person opportunity to mend the diplomatic rift opened last month by the announcement of an Australia-UK-US security pact in the Indo-Pacific.
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