One year on, Macron remains entangled by fallout of rash snap elections
"It wasn't a bad decision," approved a woman listening in. "No, because people have to be made to take their responsibilities," Macron said, glancing at the journalist's boom mic recording the conversation. "Otherwise, things fall apart from the inside. I've seen it happen before."
Was Macron sincere? During his televised New Year's address on December 31, 2024, when France was entering 2025 without a budget after the first post-dissolution government, led by Michel Barnier, had been toppled, the president publicly admitted for the first time that the move had, "for now, brought more divisions to the Assemblée than solutions for the French people." He added: "Clarity and humility require us to recognize that, for the moment, the decision has produced more instability than calm, and for that, I take full responsibility."
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LeMonde
2 hours ago
- LeMonde
Trump-Putin meeting in Alaska: A high-stakes summit for a ceasefire in Ukraine
United States President Donald Trump and Russian counterpart Vladimir Putin are set to meet in Alaska on Friday, August 15, in a high-stakes, high-risk summit that could prove decisive for the future of Ukraine. Putin will step onto Western soil for the first time since he ordered the invasion of Ukraine in February 2022, a war that has killed tens of thousands of people and on which Russia has not relented, making rapid gains just before the summit. Trump extended the invitation at the Russian leader's suggestion, but the US president has since been defensive and warned that the meeting could be over within minutes if Putin does not compromise. Trump has called the summit a "feel-out meeting" to test Putin, whom he last saw in 2019. "If it's a bad meeting, it'll end very quickly, and if it's a good meeting, we're going to end up getting peace in the pretty near future," Trump said Thursday. He gave the summit a one-in-four chance of failure. Trump's latest shift Trump has boasted of his relationship with Putin, blamed predecessor Joe Biden for the war and vowed before his return to the White House in January to bring peace within 24 hours. Yet despite repeated calls to Putin, and a stunning February 28 White House meeting in which Trump publicly berated Zelensky, the Russian leader has shown no signs of compromise. Trump has acknowledged his frustration with Putin and warned of "very severe consequences" if he does not accept a ceasefire – but also agreed to see him in Alaska. Secretary of State Marco Rubio has also called for security guarantees for Ukraine – an idea downplayed by Trump at the start of his latest term. The talks are set to begin at 11:30 am (1930 GMT) on Friday at the Elmendorf Air Force Base, the largest US military installation in Alaska and a Cold War base for surveillance of the former Soviet Union. Adding to the historical significance, the United States bought Alaska in 1867 from Russia – a deal Moscow has cited to show the legitimacy of land swaps. The Kremlin said it expected Putin and Trump to meet alone with interpreters before a working lunch with aides. Neither leader is expected to step off the base into Anchorage, Alaska's largest city, where protesters have put up signs of solidarity with Ukraine. Closely watched abroad Every word and gesture will be closely watched by European leaders and Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky, who was not included and has publicly refused pressure from Trump to surrender territory seized by Russia. Zelensky said on Tuesday that the Alaska summit was a "personal victory" for Putin. With the trip, Putin "is coming out of isolation" and he has "somehow postponed sanctions," which Trump had vowed to impose on Russia without progress. Trump has promised to consult with European leaders and Zelensky, saying that any final agreement would come in a three-way meeting with Putin and the Ukrainian president to "divvy up" territory. Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov, meanwhile, responded to a question from Russian state TV by saying that Moscow would not make guesses on the outcome of the meeting. "We never make any predictions ahead of time," Lavrov said after he reached Alaska, wearing what appeared to be a shirt with "USSR" written across it in Cyrillic script. "Our position is clear and unambiguous. We will present it," he said. Sanctions eased The summit marks a sharp shift from the approach of Western European leaders and Biden, who vowed no discussion with Russia on Ukraine's future unless Ukraine was also at the table. Putin faces an arrest warrant from the International Criminal Court, leading him to curtail travel sharply since the war began. However, the United States is not a party to the Hague tribunal, and Trump's Treasury Department temporarily eased sanctions on top Russian officials to allow them to travel and use bank cards in Alaska. Exiled Russian opposition figure Yulia Navalnaya – whose husband Alexei Navalny died in prison last year – urged the two leaders to strike a deal to "release Russian political activists and journalists, Ukrainian civilians, [and] those who were imprisoned for anti-war statements and posts on social media."
France 24
3 hours ago
- France 24
Macron vows to punish antisemitic 'hatred' after memorial tree cut down
Politicians across the political spectrum condemned the act as an attack against the memory of Ilan Halimi, who was kidnapped by a gang of around 20 youths in January 2006 and tortured in a low-income housing estate in the Paris suburb of Bagneux. Found three weeks later, the 23-year-old died on the way to hospital. An olive tree, planted in 2011 in Halimi's memory, was cut down, probably with a chainsaw, on Wednesday night in the northern Paris suburb of Epinay-sur-Seine. The incident stoked fresh concerns about an increase in antisemitic acts and hate crimes in France as international tensions mount over Gaza. "Every effort will be made to punish this act of hatred," Macron said on X, adding that France's fight against antisemitism will be "uncompromising". "The nation will not forget this son of France who died because he was Jewish," Macron said. Prime Minister Francois Bayrou called the tree "a living bulwark against oblivion". "The never-ending fight against the deadly poison of hatred is our primary duty," he added. Officials pledged to plant a new memorial tree "as soon as possible". - 'Extremely painful' - Members of France's Jewish community -- one of the largest in the world -- have said the number of antisemitic acts has surged following the attack by Hamas on Israel on October 7, 2023 which was followed by Israel's bombardment of the Gaza Strip and aid blockade. In 2006, Halimi's murder struck horror into France's Jewish community and stirred debate about antisemitism in France. Police at the time initially refused to consider the murder a hate crime, and tens of thousands took to the street to demand justice. Yonathan Arfi, president of the Representative Council of Jewish Institutions in France (CRIF), said on Friday the felling of the tree was "extremely painful". "There is nothing more cowardly, and those who have murdered his memory are no better than those who took his life 20 years ago," Arfi told AFP. "This is not just another antisemitic act, it is a way for antisemites to shout that they are here more than ever." Herve Chevreau, the mayor of Epinay-sur-Seine, filed a criminal complaint. Paris police chief Laurent Nunez condemned what he called a "despicable act" and said an investigation had been launched. Halimi was lured by a 17-year-old girl to a housing estate basement in the suburbs, where he was attacked and subdued with ether. Held prisoner for ransom, Halimi was tortured for 24 days before he was found naked, bound and gagged on February 13, 2006. Youssouf Fofana, the head of the gang dubbed the "Barbarians", was sentenced to life in prison. The son of Ivorian immigrants, Fofana had recruited followers among youths from Paris's bleak immigrant suburbs. Two other trees planted in tribute to Halimi were vandalised and sawn down in 2019 in the southern suburb of Sainte-Genevieve-des-Bois, where Halimi was found dying near a railway track. Reported antisemitic acts in France surged from 436 in 2022 to 1,676 in 2023, before dipping to 1,570 last year, according to the interior ministry.
Euronews
4 hours ago
- Euronews
Fact check: Are most refugees in Europe of Muslim background?
ADVERTISEMENT A politician from the far-right Portuguese Chega party, which is known for its anti-immigration policies, alleged in a post shared on X that "85% of refugees are Muslim" on 1 August. Chega has previously faced accusations of Islamophobia, with the party's leader André Ventura having called for the "drastic reduction of the Islamic presence in the European Union.' Chega party's lawmaker Pedro Frazão also claimed that "instead of seeking asylum" in other Muslim countries, these individuals "choose to flee to the West." Both claims are difficult to back with data, as there is a lack of precise and up-to-date data cataloguing refugees' religious affiliation. However, it is evident that wars, economic crises and natural disasters impact the makeup of the global refugee population. While the United Nations produces a vast amount of data on refugees and forcibly displaced people worldwide, it is heavily reliant on government data. While some countries provide information on refugees' religious affiliations, others do not. Where did refugees come from in 2024? According to the UN refugee agency UNHCR, the global refugee population, including people in need of international protection, reached nearly 42.7 million in 2024. In addition, there were 73.5 million people displaced within the borders of their own countries (IDPs) and 8.4 million asylum-seekers. Within Europe, Germany was the European country which hosted the most refugees in 2024 — which has been the case since 2015. Research conducted by the German government published in 2021 revealed that between 2013 and 2019, 69.7% of the refugees it hosted were Muslim faithful. However, these figures predate Russia's full-scale invasion of Ukraine in early 2022, when millions of Ukrainians were forced to leave the country at war. The latest data from the UNHCR showed that in 2024, nearly seven out of 10 of all refugees and people in need of international protection originated from Syria, Afghanistan, South Sudan, Venezuela and Ukraine. The main religion in Syria, Afghanistan and South Sudan is Islam, but in Ukraine and Venezuela, different branches of Christianity are the predominant belief. Given that Ukrainians and Venezuelans made up nearly one-third of all refugees and other people in need of international protection in 2024, it is "unlikely" that 85% of refugees are Muslim, a UN spokesperson told EuroVerify. Although a country may have a Muslim-majority population, this does not mean that all refugees who originate from there are Muslim, and vice versa. In addition, those who nominally belong to an ethnic group associated with Islam might not be actual believers. Muslim-majority nations top the list of host countries Contrary to the claim that refugees of Muslim background predominantly seek refuge in the West, Germany is the only European country which features among the seven countries which have hosted the most asylum seekers since 2015. Iran and Turkey are the two top countries where the most refugees sought asylum between 2015 and 2024. Meanwhile, four out of the seven nations which hosted the most asylum seekers in this period — Iran, Turkey, Chad and Pakistan — were Muslim-majority countries, which debunks the claim that refugees who identify as Muslim only seek refuge in the West.
