French journalist detained in Ethiopia released after a week

Antoine Galindo was “freed after a week in prison and was able to leave Addis Ababa to return to Paris,” Paul Deutschmann, an editor-in-chief at the publication, told AFP.

Galindo, who heads the publication’s East Africa section, had travelled to Ethiopia to cover the African Union…[Read more]

French police arrest activists after break-in at ‘forever chemicals’ plant

Around 300 people from the Extinction Rebellion and Youth for Climate groups cut through fences to reach the Arkema site at Pierre-Benite factory near Lyon in southeast France, a spokesman for the organisers said.

Once inside they deployed banners and spray-painted…[Read more]

Paris Olympics unveils ‘joyful’ art deco-style posters inspired by famous landmarks

The posters were unveiled on Monday at the Musée d’Orsay — a former railway station transformed into an imposing museum stretching along the Seine River — in the presence of Paris 2024 director of design Joachim Roncin and the artist behind them, Ugo Gatton…[Read more]

French troops limited to non-combat role, minister says, after Macron remarks on Ukraine

“We must consider new actions to support Ukraine. These must respond to very specific needs, I am thinking in particular of mine clearance, cyberdefence, the production of weapons on site, on Ukrainian territory,” Stephane Sejourne told lawmakers.

“Some of…[Read more]

Tunisian imam expelled from France vows to appeal decision

Mahjoub Mahjoubi, from the town of Bagnols-sur-Ceze in the south of France, denounced his removal as “arbitrary”.

The cleric’s decision came a day he was expelled from France for “radicalism” and “unacceptable remarks”, French Interior Minister Gérald Darmanin said in a statement posted…[Read more]

France blames Russia’s FSB for anti-Semitic Star of David graffiti campaign

French prosecutors reported in November that 60 such stars had been found in the capital and surrounding suburbs weeks into the war between Israel and Hamas, with the graffiti being interpreted as a threat to Jews.

A Moldovan couple was arrested in the case and their a…[Read more]

Eiffel Tower reopens after six-day strike over monument’s maintenance

The operator of the 330-meter (1,083-foot) tower said in a statement it reached an agreement with unions representing the workers after promising to allocate an “ambitious 380 million euro (about $412 million) investment by 2031” for renovation work. This week, it also launc…[Read more]

France launches anti-corruption push ahead of 2024 Paris Olympics

Andy Spalding, an academic and author who studies corruption in sporting “mega-events” such as the Olympics or the football World Cup, believes French authorities are showing they are serious about delivering a clean Games.

Three preliminary investigations are into possible…[Read more]

How France became the target of Azerbaijan’s smear campaign

Azerbaijan’s February 7 presidential election, which handed President Ilham Aliyev an unsurprising and unopposed victory with 92% of the vote and a fifth term in office, provided the backdrop for the latest illustration of deteriorating Franco-Azerbaijani relations.

For the first time i…[Read more]

French PM Attal promises new law on prices to appease angry farmers

Attal promised to elevate agriculture “to the status of a fundamental national interest”, outlining an agriculture bill designed to address farmers’ grievances.

Already last month, farmers had staged crippling nationwide protests before their unions called for them to be…[Read more]

Paris court halves ex-French president Sarkozy’s 2012 campaign financing sentence

But while lighter than the original sentence, Wednesday’s ruling was still harsher than the one-year suspended sentence that prosecutors called for.

The Paris court of appeal confirmed a lower court’s guilty verdict for Sarkozy, who was convicted of hiding illegal…[Read more]

French skipper Clarisse Crémer denies cheating in Vendée Globe solo race

“We never cheated,” Clarisse Crémer insisted on Thursday in a joint statement with her husband Tanguy Le Turquais.

They were responding to an anonymous e-mail sent to the French Sailing Federation (FFVoile) last Sunday.

In it Crémer was accused of using information rel…[Read more]

‘Wind of revolt’ sweeps French cinema in belated #MeToo reckoning

French cinema’s #MeToo breakthrough has been heralded, and pushed back, often enough to warrant caution – but there are signs the ground is finally shifting, more than six years after cinema’s feminist revolution kicked off across the Atlantic.

In 2017, at the dawn of the #MeTo…[Read more]

Climate activist Greta Thunberg joins protest against new French motorway

Thunberg came as part of a delegation of French, Belgian, Swedish and Spanish activists to the site near the southwestern city of Toulouse.

“We are here to stand in solidarity with the people who are resisting this project and this madness,” Thunberg told reporters,…[Read more]

‘It’s non-negotiable’: French MPs angry at move to restrict citizenship on Mayotte

Emmanuel Macron has been accused of walking a dangerous legal and political tightrope with a proposal to restrict access to French nationality for people born on the Indian Ocean island of Mayotte to immigrant parents.

The far right has welcomed the move, which…[Read more]

Robert Badinter, French ex-minister who fought to abolish death penalty, dies at 95

The soft-spoken attorney, who said he could not abide by a “killer justice system”, was widely vilified for pushing through legislation banning the death penalty at a time when most French people still supported the practice.

He said later he had “never felt so…[Read more]

‘They’re drowning us in regulations’: how Europe’s furious farmers took on Brussels and won

On the outskirts of the northern Spanish city of Pamplona, a green, red and blue stream of New Holland, John Deere, Massey Ferguson, Fendt and Deutz-Fahr tractors trundled forwards, horns honking and orange lights flashing.

Under drizzly grey skies a…[Read more]

Fighting the smartphone ‘invasion’: the French village that voted to ban scrolling in public

picture of a smartphone with a red line through it serves as a warning in the window of a hairdresser’s shop in a French village that has voted to ban people scrolling on their phones in public. “Everyone is struggling with too much screen time,”…[Read more]

Paris mayor faces pushback over plans for car-free Eiffel Tower zone

Thousands of tourists jostle every day to snap the Eiffel Tower from across the River Seine on the hill at Trocadero, with its magnificent gardens and a modernist palace housing museums.

Walking to Trocadero is less romantic, however, requiring the crossing of two major…[Read more]

Macron administration formalises tougher immigration law

The law’s promulgation comes after France’s Constitutional Council censured 35 of its 86 articles, including contentious additions insisted on by the right, such as measures restricting access to social benefits and the introduction of immigration quotas.

While the bill was seen as one of…[Read more]