BRUSSELS - (AFP) - German Chancellor Olaf Scholz and French President Emmanuel Macron expressed a desire for calm during a Thursday-Friday night meeting in Brussels after the differences that emerged publicly between Paris and Berlin.

And the German Chancellor said at the end of the first day of a European summit that led to a joint road map to try to reduce energy prices, that "the cooperation between Germany and France , as well as between the chancellor and the president, is intense and fruitful."

In response to a question about the disagreement with the French president, who on Thursday doubled his criticism and warned Germany against isolation, Schulz said that he meets Macron "constantly" and has now set a date for a next meeting with him, Wednesday, in Paris.

But this meeting will be held next week instead of the French-German cabinet, which was postponed due to disagreements over a number of issues.
Schultz stressed that he "did not feel isolated in any way" during the long and arduous talks on the energy file.

Macron Schulz was in great disagreement when they arrived Thursday at the European Union meeting and held a private meeting that lasted half an hour, without advisers, before they met the other leaders of the bloc countries.

In statements to reporters, the French president expressed his satisfaction that this meeting "allowed many things to be clarified" in order to "obtain Germany's approval" of the final text, stressing that France played its "role" by creating "unity between positions."

"We do not always adopt the same positions, and this is normal," he added, trying to downplay the importance of the differences that the French side talked about before and during the summit.