French President Francois Hollande has said a cease-fire and a political settlement in Ukraine are conditions for France to deliver the first of two Mistral-class warships to Russia.
Speaking on the sidelines of a NATO summit in Wales on September 4, Hollande said the contract to supply the vessels was neither cancelled nor suspended.
But he said the conditions for delivering the first ship, due to be handed over to Russia in October, did not exist.
France announced on September 3 that Moscow's aggressive actions in eastern Ukraine were the reasons for the decision not to deliver the warship, called the "Vladivostok."
France had come under strong public pressure from the United States and European partners to scrap the 1.2 billion euro ($1.6 billion), signed under former President Nicolas Sarkozy in 2011.
