Russia is closely monitoring the French election campaign, Russian presidential spokesman Dmitry Peskov.

Ex-PM François Fillon won the first round of presidential primary voting among center-right candidates in France advancing to the second round next week against another former prime minister, Alain Juppé, who came in second.

At the same time the ex-president of France Nicolas Sarkozy became the third and was dropped out from a presidential race, RIA Novosti reported.

Peskov said that the Putin-Sarkozy relations were established when Putin headed the government adding that they have rather intensive contacts.

Russian presidential spokesman noted that France is a partner of Russia with which the country “has good relations", and the scale of cooperation between two countries can be much bigger, than now