Category Archives: France

Could Marine Le Pen finally triumph with her third tilt at French presidency?

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Next year’s Élysée race looks like a battle between a fading Emmanuel Macron and the far-right leader. And some believe she might win this time

In Paris’s symbolic Place de la République, under the watchful gaze of France’s allegorical figurehead Marianne, the skateboarders are not in the mood to discuss politics.

For the young here, as everywhere, life has been paused during a pandemic that has halted studies, jobs, socialising and parties. What they want is their lives back, not to talk about an election.

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French citizens advised to leave Pakistan as protests worsen

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Pakistani government bans religious leader as row over satirical cartoons simmers

French nationals and companies in Pakistan have been advised by their embassy to leave temporarily after violent anti-France protests brought large parts of the country to a standstill.

Anti-French sentiment has been simmering for months in Pakistan since Emmanuel Macron expressed support for a satirical magazine’s right to republish cartoons depicting the prophet Muhammad, deemed blasphemous by many Muslims.

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Third of French wine lost after rare cold snaps devastate vines

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Unseasonal frost is ‘agricultural disaster of 21st century’ as ice after warm weather decimates grape harvests

At least a third of French wine production worth almost €2bn (£1.7bn) in sales will be lost this year after rare freezing temperatures devastated many vines and fruit crops across France, raising concerns over the climate crisis.

“This is probably the greatest agricultural catastrophe of the beginning of the 21st century,” the French agriculture minister, Julien Denormandie, said this week as the government declared an “agricultural disaster” and began preparing emergency financial measures.

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France, Germany and UK raise concern over Iran’s nuclear plans

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Three European countries say there is no ‘credible civilian need’ for enriching uranium to 60%

France, Germany and the UK have warned that Iran took a dangerous step towards the production of a nuclear weapon by enriching uranium to levels for which there is no “credible civilian need”.

Tehran, which claims its nuclear ambitions are limited to creating energy, announced this week it was boosting its levels of uranium enrichment to 60%, just short of weapons-grade purity. The 2015 nuclear deal only allows enrichment to a purity level of 3.67%.

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France to ban some domestic flights where train available

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MPs vote to suspend internal flights if the trip can be completed by train within two and a half hours instead

French MPs have voted to suspend domestic airline flights that can be made by direct train in less than two and a half hours, as part of a series of climate and environmental measures.

After a heated debate in the Assemblée Nationale at the weekend, the ban, a watered-down version of a key recommendation from President Emmanuel Macron’s citizens’ climate convention, was adopted.

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France and Germany’s Covid vaccination programmes pick up speed

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As daily inoculations hit record figures, warning comes of new delays

Vaccine rollouts in France and Germany have finally begun to pick up speed, after a slow start and problems with supplies and bureaucracy.

France continues to struggle to contain a third Covid-19 wave, but announced it had hit its 10 million inoculations target a week earlier than expected, while Germany doubled the number of vaccinations, administering a record 720,000 doses on Thursday after the rollout was extended to family doctors.

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‘Kill the bill’ and trans visibility: human rights this fortnight in pictures

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A round-up of the coverage on struggles for human rights and freedoms, from Mexico to China

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French winemakers count cost of ‘worst frost in decades’

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Government prepares rescue package as rare freezing temperatures damage crops and vines

Winemakers across France are counting the cost of several nights of frost this week that threaten to decimate grape harvests in some of the country’s best-known and prestigious wine-producing regions.

The government is readying an emergency rescue package after rare freezing temperatures that could cause some of the worst damage in decades to crops and vines.

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France under pressure to admit responsibility for Mali airstrike

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Paris has repeatedly dismissed UN report into attack that killed 19 wedding guests as not credible

France is facing growing calls to accept responsibility for an airstrike that killed 19 civilians at a wedding in a village in Mali in January, following the publication of a United Nations report into the attack.

The damning investigation by the UN released last month, its first into French military action, said the airstrike hit Bounti village on 3 January, killing 19 guests at the wedding and three militants.

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The world won’t be greener until it’s fairer | Simone Tagliapietra

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Action on the climate crisis must come with a social contract to protect the poor and vulnerable


As a climate policy researcher, I am often asked: what is the biggest obstacle to decarbonisation? My answer has changed profoundly over the last couple of years. I used to point to the lack of affordable green technologies and an absence of political will. Today, I point to something else. Something less tangible, but possibly more challenging: the absence of a green social contract.

The green revolution is already unfolding, driven by a stunning reduction in the cost of green technologies and by a global momentum for climate neutrality by the mid-century. So, if cheaper green technology and an unprecedented political green ambition are rapidly converging, what could go wrong? Unfortunately, the situation is not as simple as it seems. Decarbonisation will reshape our economies and our lifestyles. Nothing will be left untouched in the process: the green world will be profoundly different from the one we know today.

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Macron to close elite school that hothouses French leaders

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Institution has been pathway to power for country’s elite, including four French presidents

Emmanuel Macron is expected to officially announce on Thursday the closure of the École Nationale d’Administration, the elite French finishing school for the country’s leaders where he studied.

Known as ENA, the grande école has been the hothouse for France’s top civil service and a pathway to power in the public and private sectors. Four French presidents, including Macron, have passed through its doors as have dozens of ministers and business leaders.

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Stone slab found in France thought to be Europe’s oldest 3D map

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Archaeologists believe 4,000-year-old engravings on Saint-Bélec Slab resemble topological features

Archaeologists in France have uncovered a stone with 4,000-year-old etchings they believe may be the oldest three-dimensional map in Europe.

The engravings on the broken stone appear to resemble topological features including hills and a river network.

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‘This is not an easy treasure hunt’: puzzle book offers readers chance to win €750,000 golden casket

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Clues in The Golden Treasure of the Entente Cordiale could lead readers in the UK and France to a historic treasure presented by Britain to the French president in 1903

For all the armchair puzzlers for whom sudokus and crosswords have palled over the long months of lockdown, a fiendish new literary conundrum is about to slide on to bookshelves – with a rather lucrative and unusual reward.

Artist Michel Becker tracked down and bought the golden casket given to France by the UK ahead of the signing of the entente cordiale on 8 April 1904, which attempted to end centuries of antagonism between the two countries. Presented to French president Émile Loubet in July 1903, the casket was wrought by Goldsmiths and Silversmiths Company in London and contained a scroll celebrating friendship between the two countries. Valued at €750,000 (£646,000), the intricately decorated box is now the prize for whoever solves the clues in Becker’s forthcoming treasure hunt book, The Golden Treasure of the Entente Cordiale.

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French tycoon Bernard Tapie tied up and beaten in burglary

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Former owner of Adidas and his wife attacked during raid in Combs-la-Ville near Paris

The former French minister and scandal-ridden tycoon Bernard Tapie, once the owner of Adidas, was attacked along with his wife during a night-time burglary of their home, police have said.

The couple were asleep when four men broke into the house in Combs-la-Ville near Paris around 12.30am local time on Sunday, beat them and tied them up with electrical cords before making off with stolen goods.

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Mozambique: French energy giant Total withdraws after militant attacks

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Dozens of people have died in the attacks launched by Islamic State-linked insurgents

French energy company Total has withdrawn all its staff from its Afungi natural gas site in northern Mozambique, sources say, as clashes between Islamic State-linked fighters and the military rage nearby.

The company, which last week called off the planned resumption of construction at the $20bn development due to the violence, declined to comment when contacted by Reuters.

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French lockdown will hit economic growth, finance minister warns

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Bruno Le Maire’s forecast follows imposition of third national lockdown by Emmanuel Macron

A fresh lockdown in France will dent economic growth this year but it is too early to say by how much, the finance minister, Bruno Le Maire, has warned.

Amid concerns that increasing infection rates across much of continental Europe will slow the recovery from the pandemic, Le Maire indicated on Friday that a forecast of 6% GDP growth this year may need to be revised downwards.

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Curfews and quarantines: Europe faces another Easter of Covid restrictions

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From France to Spain, Germany to Greece, tight rules are in place to contain the spread of coronavirus

Europe may not be subject to the drastic lockdown measures introduced to combat the first wave of coronavirus a year ago, but many countries still face another Easter of greatly reduced meeting and movement.

In France, new restrictions come into effect across the country from 7pm on Saturday that limit travel to within 10km (six miles) of home, absent one of the allowed “imperative” reasons. Sworn declarations known as “attestations” will be necessary for anyone travelling outside these rules.

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Merkel, Macron and Putin in talks on using Sputnik V jab in Europe, says Kremlin

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Moscow says leaders discussed possibility of shipments and joint production amid shortage of doses inside Europe

Vladimir Putin, Angela Merkel and Emmanuel Macron discussed Russia’s Sputnik V vaccine and its use in Europe on a conference call on Tuesday, the Kremlin said.

Moscow’s statement said that among other subjects the Russian, German and French leaders discussed prospects for the registration of the vaccine in the EU and the possibility of shipments and joint production in EU nations. It did not say who raised the topic.

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Tourists in Greece and Spain but most of Covid-hit Europe plans Easter at home

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Several thousand Germans head to Crete and Balearic islands as pandemic third wave spreads across EU

The first foreign tourists may have landed in locked-down Spain and Greece, but as a third wave of the pandemic accelerates across the EU, few Europeans will be enjoying an Easter break abroad – or even away from home.

German holidaymakers began arriving on Crete on Monday, with six half-empty flights landing at Heraklion airport after the tourist minister, Haris Theoharis, said some visitors could be permitted before the country’s planned reopening on 14 May.

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French pharma firm found guilty over medical scandal in which up to 2,000 died

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Servier accused of covering up potentially fatal side-effects of the Mediator diabetes drug

A French court has fined one of the country’s biggest pharmaceutical firms €2.7m (£2.3m) after finding it guilty of deception and manslaughter over a pill linked to the deaths of up to 2,000 people.

In one of the biggest medical scandals in France, the privately owned laboratory Servier was accused of covering up the potentially fatal side-effects of the widely prescribed drug Mediator.

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