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French first Lady brigitte macron Met an old friend – a giant panda was born France – On the last Friday of the visit to China with the President Emmanuel Macron,
At a panda reserve in southwest China, where Yuan Meng now calls home, the first lady was surprised to see how big he had grown. They helped choose his name – which means “fulfilling a dream” – when he was born in a French zoo in 2017.
“When they’re born, they’re like this,” she said, holding two fingers a short distance apart. Meanwhile, the fat male wandered around in his enclosure, eating bamboo and ignoring the onlookers who were calling his name in hopes of getting a response.
“They have a very independent character,” he said. “They do what they want.”
For decades, China has gifted animals to friendly countries and loaned pandas to foreign zoos on commercial terms to smooth and promote relations with other countries, often referred to as “panda diplomacy.”
Emmanuel Macron’s state visit to China this week, his fourth as president, included meetings with Chinese leader Xi Jinping and other officials, discussions on Russia’s war in Ukraine, trade relations and other issues.
The China Wildlife Conservation Association said during the visit that it signed a letter of intent to send the two animals to Beauval Zoo, south of Paris, under a new 10-year round of panda cooperation with France in 2027.
The French zoo sent two 17-year-old pandas – Huan Huan, a female, and her partner Yuan Zi – back to China last month after a 13-year loan in France.
Yuan Meng was their cub, conceived by artificial insemination.
Despite being built in France, it officially belonged to the Chinese government. Yuan Meng said “goodbye” to France in 2023, sent to a new life at the Chengdu Research Base for Giant Panda Breeding in southwest China, where Brigitte Macron, considered her “godmother”, came to see her.
Huan Huan and Yuan Zi also gave birth to twin daughters in France in 2021.
Huanlili and Yuandudu are also expected to leave Beauval Zoo for China in the future. The China Wildlife Conservation Association has previously said it hopes they will remain in the French zoo until January 2027.
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Ken Moritsugu in Beijing and John Leicester in Paris contributed to this report.