France has been the most active among EU countries in discussing the scrapping of the visa regime with Russia, the Kremlin chief of staff said on Tuesday.
Sergei Naryshkin made his statement after talks with French President chief of staff Claude Gueant in Paris.
"It has to be said that our French partners are maintaining an active position on our proposals and are ready to move towards an easing of the visa regime... more daringly than our other European partners," Naryshkin said.
The leaders of Russia, Germany and France encouraged measures towards the lifting of the visa regime between Russia and the EU in October.
The Kremlin has made visa-free travel between Russia and the EU a foreign policy priority. Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov rebuked the EU in September for dragging its heels on the issue, saying that Russia wanted a "clear answer."
Russia submitted a draft agreement on scrapping the visa regime to the EU at the Russia-EU summit in the southern city of Rostov-on-Don on May 31.
PARIS, November 16 (RIA Novosti)
