Category Archives: France

Paris mayor Anne Hidalgo to run for French presidency

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Socialist to campaign on her story of ‘overcoming class prejudice’ in bid to win back voters for the left in 2022

The Socialist mayor of Paris, Anne Hidalgo, has announced a bid for the French presidency, saying that as a woman with working-class, immigrant roots she will try to repair the anger and divisions in French society and win back low-income workers disillusioned with the left.

“The Republican model is disintegrating before our eyes,” Hidalgo told supporters gathered on the docks in Rouen, Normandy. She warned of growing inequalities, saying: “I want all children in France to have the same opportunities I had.”

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France’s former health minister charged over handling of Covid crisis

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Agnès Buzyn accused of ‘endangering the lives of others’ after early statements minimised risk of pandemic

France’s former health minister Agnès Buzyn has been charged over her handling of the Covid-19 pandemic after investigators at a special court in Paris concluded there were grounds to prosecute her.

Buzyn has been charged with “endangering the lives of others”, according to the prosecutor in a special court that deals with ministerial accountability. A second possible offence of “failure to stop a disaster” was not brought.

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Who will take on Macron in France’s 2022 presidential race?

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A #MeToo figurehead, a mayor and a hate-speech ideologue among those tipped to put their hats in the ring

At rush hour at Paris’s Saint-Lazare station, activists, including a civil servant in a government ministry and a former climate-change protester, were out canvassing for an unusual would-be candidate for French president.

Their choice, Sandrine Rousseau, is a figurehead of the French #MeToo movement against sexual violence, an economist and university vice-chancellor and promises a new form of “punk ecology”.

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France accuses Patel of blackmail in row over Channel migrants

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Interior minister says UK plans to return boats of vulnerable people would not be accepted

Priti Patel has been accused by France’s interior minister of plotting “financial blackmail” and a violation of international maritime law in a deepening diplomatic row over efforts to prevent migrants from crossing the Channel by boat.

Gérald Darmanin said that UK plans, released on Wednesday night, to send back boats of vulnerable people into French waters would not be accepted by his government.

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Syria cement plant at centre of terror finance investigation ‘used by western spies’

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Jordanian intelligence officer tells Guardian Lafarge factory was used by intelligence agencies to gather information on IS hostages

A cement plant in Syria at the centre of a terror financing investigation in France was used by western intelligence agencies to gather information on hostages held by Islamic State, sources connected to the operation have said.

A Jordanian intelligence officer who was central to the spying effort has confirmed to the Guardian that the Lafarge factory, which continued operating after the terrorist group overran eastern Syria, in one of the most controversial episodes of the war, was the regional hub of a failed effort to rescue up to 30 hostages. Those IS held included the American journalist James Foley, British photographer John Cantlie and Jordanian pilot Moaz al-Kasasbeh, two of whom were later confirmed to have been killed.

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France grants citizenship to 12,000 Covid frontline workers

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Fast-track scheme is aimed at those whose jobs put them at risk in pandemic

France has granted citizenship to more than 12,000 frontline workers whose jobs put them at risk during the Covid pandemic under a special fast-track scheme.

As well as speeding up the application process, which normally takes up to two years, the government also cut the residency requirement from five years to two.

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Priti Patel to send boats carrying migrants to UK back across Channel

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Border Force is being trained on ‘turn-around’ tactics but France warns plan could endanger lives

Priti Patel is preparing to send back small boats carrying migrants in the Channel despite warnings from the French authorities that it could endanger lives.

Border Force staff are being trained to employ “turn-around” tactics at sea under plans developed for two years, a statement from the Home Office said.

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Jewellery worth €10m stolen in heist at Bulgari store in Paris

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Two armed robbers are in custody after a police chase, with a hunt under way for remaining suspects

A group of thieves have struck the Bulgari store on the Place Vendôme in Paris, making off with about €10m (£8.6m) in jewellery. They then led police on a high-speed chase during which two of the suspects were captured, sources have told AFP.

Three individuals, wearing sharp suits and armed with guns, robbed the recently revamped boutique on the Place Vendôme in central Paris, where the Ritz hotel is located, shortly before midday on Tuesday, police said.

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Belgian broadcaster releases interview with on-the-run Paris terror suspect

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RTBF reporter unwittingly spoke to Salah Abdeslam, alleged kingpin of attacks that killed 130

A day before he goes on trial in the French capital, Belgian public broadcaster RTBF has released an interview with the alleged kingpin of the Paris terror attacks, recorded as he was fleeing France in the aftermath of the 2015 massacre.

Salah Abdeslam and 19 others are accused of planning, aiding and carrying out the 13 November suicide bomb and gun attacks on the Stade de France, bars, restaurants and the Bataclan concert hall that killed 130 people and injured 490.

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Jean-Paul Belmondo: the beaten-up icon who made crime sexy

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Immortalised by Godard and Melville, the actor specialised in seductive tough guys – and blazed a trail through movie history

On the streets of Paris, car thief and fugitive cop killer Michel Poiccard has just been gunned down by the police, having shown an insolent, fatalistic attitude to the idea of getting caught, and indeed to the revelation that his American girlfriend Patricia, wannabe journalist and street vendor of the New York Herald Tribune, has ratted him out. She leans over Michel as he lies dying in a puddle of blood. Will Michel come up with some resonant last words? Not exactly. Defying agony from his bullet wounds, he just clownishly stretches his face into the two silly expressions he’d earlier used to explain the phrase “faire la tête”: a goofy silent scream, then a panto grin. Isn’t this what acting is, what life is: tragedy, comedy, faces, speeches? Who cares?

This unforgettably bizarre, throwaway gesture – the equal of “Here’s looking at you, kid” from Michel’s beloved Bogart – set the seal on Jean-Paul Belmondo’s sensational breakthrough in 1960 in Jean-Luc Godard’s equally legendary debut, À Bout de Souffle (AKA Breathless), from a treatment by François Truffaut and Claude Chabrol, and co-starring Jean Seberg as the American mesmerised by his erotic, existential bravado.

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Newly discovered Napoleon hat with his DNA up for auction

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Buyer at small German auction house did not know bicorne had belonged to the French emperor

A newly discovered hat with DNA evidence proving it belonged to Napoleon Bonaparte has gone on display at auction house Bonhams in Hong Kong.

Described by Bonhams as the “first hat to bear the emperor’s DNA“, it is being previewed in Hong Kong before it moves to Paris and then London, where it will be auctioned on 27 October.

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‘It’s exactly like a puzzle’: experts on piecing together Roman fresco find

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House in southern France yielded find of outstanding wall paintings dating from 1st century BC

On the right bank of the Rhône in the Provençal town of Arles, the Roman-built House of the Harpist is being hailed as a remarkable record of ancient architecture and interior decoration.

Now, experts have opened their workshop to reveal their painstaking attempts to piece together the vast jigsaw of magnificent and never before seen frescoes discovered in the property thought to date back more than two millennia.

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Paris attack survivors await start of France’s biggest ever criminal trial

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20 men accused of involvement in 2015 massacre, but it is unclear whether the key accused will break their silence

Deep inside Paris’s historic law courts on the bank of the River Seine, builders were putting the finishing touches to an extraordinary architectural structure described as a cross between a high-security bunker and modern church.

Its sleek pale wood and white lighting were chosen by the French justice ministry to create “a sense of calm” in contrast to the horrific events which will soon be examined there. This temporary structure will from next week host the biggest criminal trial ever held in France, when 20 men are accused of planning, aiding and carrying out the November 2015 Paris terrorist attacks on a stadium, bars and restaurants and the Bataclan concert hall.

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Google appeals €500m French fine in dispute over news copyright

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US tech firm fined for not complying with order to come up with proposals on compensating publishers

Google is appealing against a €500m (£430m) fine imposed by France’s antitrust watchdog after a dispute with local media about paying for news content.

The financial penalty came amid increasing international pressure on online platforms such as Google and Facebook to share more of the revenue they make from using media outlets’ content.

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West may benefit from pragmatic approach after defeat to Taliban

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Analysis: forging an acceptable agreement with new Afghan regime will require careful diplomacy

The history of war is littered with losing parties struggling to accept the terms or even the fact of their defeat. At the end of the first world war, Germany’s then chancellor Philipp Scheidemann announced: “May the hand wither that binds us in such shackles.”

Some of the demands by the US and its allies on how the Taliban must behave now contain similar self-denial. It is as if the US remains in control of Kabul, as orders are issued on future Taliban actions ranging from the release of refugees to the future makeup of the government, its counter-terrorism policies and the place of women in society.

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International talks aim for consensus on Taliban government

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Western G7 powers are meeting Turkey, Qatar and Nato in Doha to discuss how Kabul airport could be reopened

Talks are due in Doha and New York to try to reach an international consensus on the conditions for recognising the Taliban government in Afghanistan. There are signs of tensions between superpowers after Russia called on the US to release Afghan central bank reserves that Washington blocked after the Taliban’s takeover of Kabul earlier this month.

“If our western colleagues are actually worried about the fate of the Afghan people, then we must not create additional problems for them by freezing gold and foreign exchange reserves,” said the Kremlin’s envoy to Afghanistan, Zamir Kabulov.

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Michel Barnier joins long list of leaders vying to unite French centre-right

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Analysis: Les Républicains face complex battle to find 2022 presidential candidate to rival Macron and Marine Le Pen

This week’s declaration by Michel Barnier, the former EU chief negotiator on Brexit, that he aims to run for French president has added to the uncertainty of a crowded field of candidates competing to represent the traditional right in next spring’s election.

The rightwing Les Républicains, the party of the former president Nicolas Sarkozy, is facing an increasingly complex battle to identify a 2022 presidential candidate to rival the centrist Emmanuel Macron and the far-right Marine Le Pen, who, polls currently show, could once again face one another in the final.

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Manchester City’s Benjamin Mendy charged with four counts of rape

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  • France defender remanded in custody by Cheshire police
  • Mendy also charged with one count of sexual assault

Manchester City’s Benjamin Mendy has been charged with four counts of rape, Cheshire Constabulary has confirmed. City have also suspended the France international pending an investigation.

In a statement, the force said: “The Crown Prosecution Service has authorised Cheshire Constabulary to charge a man in connection with allegations of sexual assault. Benjamin Mendy, aged 27, has been charged with four counts of rape and one count of sexual assault.

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