French President Emmanuel Macron | Pool photo by Guillaume Horcajuelo/AFP via Getty Images Macron urges Trump not to get out of Africa Remarks come after US officials indicated Washington is considering a reduction in its military presence.

PAU, France — Emmanuel Macron's motto must be "never say die."

After failing to persuade Donald Trump to stick with the Paris climate accord, and not to abandon the Iran nuclear deal, the French president is now trying to convince his U.S. counterpart not to draw down the U.S. troop presence in Africa.

"If the U.S. decided to withdraw from Africa, it would be bad news for us," Macron said late Monday at a press conference following a summit in Pau, southwestern France, with the presidents of the five African countries that make up the G5 Sahel coalition: Burkina Faso, Chad, Mali, Mauritania and Niger.

"I would like to be able to convince President Trump that the fight against terrorism to which he is deeply committed is playing out also in this region."

Macron's remarks came after top U.S. military officials indicated Washington is contemplating a reduction in its military presence in Africa. Arriving in Brussels for meetings at NATO headquarters on Monday, the Chairman of the U.S. Joint Chiefs of Staff General Mark Milley said resources "could be reduced and then shifted, either to increase readiness of the force in the continental U.S. or shifted to" the Pacific.

Macron so far has come up empty in his previous efforts to convince Trump to alter course. The American president rejected the climate agreement and the nuclear deal and similarly rebuffed Macron's entreaties that he stay the course in northeast Syria, where there is now only a tenuous U.S. military presence, which Trump throws into doubt regularly. But none of that seems to deter Macron from trying in another theater.

The meeting in Pau was intended to underscore the urgency of the increasingly dangerous situation in the Sahel region, where the French military has long led the West's counterterrorism efforts. In one example of the escalating violence, an attack last week by suspected jihadist militants in Niger killed 89 soldiers.

Some 4,500 French soldiers have been deployed in the area since 2014, when Mali requested help, and Macron also announced Monday he was deploying an additional 220 troops in the region.

French officials said that while the U.S. military commitment to the region is relatively small, its contributions there are still critical. The U.S. has around 6,000 defense personnel on the continent. These include special forces involved in targeting terrorist organisations as well as troops on training missions. It also has a major drone base in Niger, providing important intelligence capabilities.

"Macron plays with an open hand," said a French diplomatic official. "Africom [United States Africa Command] is 1 percent of U.S. resources abroad, and security in Africa is an interest we have in common."

While U.S. officials have not made a final decision on deployments in Africa, Macron on Monday chose to highlight a tweet by the White House's National Security Council, which was posted during the summit in Pau, expressing strong support for efforts in the Sahel.

"The United States strongly supports African, French and international efforts in the Sahel to strengthen security and combat terrorism," it said.

Escalating violence

Macron had called for this week's summit at the end of a NATO gathering last month in London after 13 French soldiers were killed on a mission in Mali, and after some officials in Mali and Burkina Faso made public comments against the French presence in the area.

The U.S. was notably absent from the day's events, which included an expanded working dinner attended by European Council President Charles Michel, the EU's foreign policy chief Josep Borrell, United Nations Secretary-General António Guterres and the African Union Commission Chairperson Moussa Faki.

EU officials said Michel was planning to propose his own summit meeting with G5 leaders and all 27 EU heads of state and government to be held before the next regular European Council summit in Brussels in late March. The EU launched the European Union Training Mission in Mali in January 2013 to help reinforce the Malian armed forces, and it includes nearly 600 troops from 25 European countries.

The five African leaders and the French president met for three hours at the Château de Pau, a castle where Napoleon III used to vacation, and emerged issuing a final statement to reiterate their "common determination to fighting terrorist groups." The five African leaders also "expressed the wish for continuing French military involvement in the Sahel, and pleaded for a reinforcement of the international presence by their side."

During the final press conference, Macron also sought to dismiss social media posts claiming French troops had only been deployed to the region to secure uranium mines, hinting that Russia or China might be behind the rumors.

"Our only interest is the fight against terrorism and the stability and sovereignty of the states where we are present," Macron said. "I hear lots of people who say all sorts of things. Ask yourself who pays them ... either they are serving the interests of the terrorists or those of other foreign powers that simply want to see the Europeans further away because they have their own mercenary agenda."

While the five African presidents clearly reaffirmed their desire for the French military presence in their final statement, they notably did not mention this during the press conference that followed. Only Macron and Burkina Faso President Roch Marc Christian Kaboré, whose country holds the rotating presidency of the regional G5 group, spoke during the press conference, even though the other presidents were seated next to them.

At one point Macron asked them if they had anything to add, and the Chadian, Nigerian and Mauritanian presidents remained awkwardly silent.

CORRECTION: This article has been updated to clarify the size and nature of the U.S. military presence in Africa.