French consumer group sues Nestlé and French ministers amid bottled water scandal
01:28
03/06/2025
French lawmakers back promoting Dreyfus 130 years after scandal
France
02/06/2025
France's upper house debates fast-fashion bill
France
01/06/2025
Macron hosts European Champions PSG at Elysée Palace and delivers speech
Europe
01/06/2025
PSG players and staff welcomed at the Elysée Palace by Macron
France
01/06/2025
Selina Sykes reporting live on les Champs-Elysées for France24
France
01/06/2025
PSG's Champions League triumph celebrated with a victory parade
France
01/06/2025
'The big day has finally come': Mbappé reacts to PSG's Champions League win
France
01/06/2025
Qatari PSG dream comes true explains our guest Simon Chadwick
France
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France 24
an hour ago
- France 24
Greenpeace activists charged with theft of Macron waxwork
The pair have now been released, but their lawyer, Marie Dose, said the activists, a man and a woman, spent three nights in a cell in "absolutely appalling conditions". "I found out this morning that I was going to be charged," one of the charged activists, who did not wish to be named, told AFP. "I find it a bit much, all this for exercising my freedom of expression in France." On Monday, several activists stole a 40,000-euro statue of Macron from the Grevin Museum and placed it in front of the Russian embassy. On Tuesday they placed Macron's double outside the headquarters of French electricity giant EDF to protest France's economic ties with Russia. They stood the statue on its feet and put next to it a sign reading "Putin-Macron radioactive allies". The waxwork, estimated to be worth 40,000 euros ($45,500), was handed over to police on Tuesday night. The pair were detained on Monday. On Thursday they were brought before an investigating judge and charged as part of a judicial inquiry into "the theft of a cultural object on display", the Paris prosecutor's office told AFP. Jean-Francois Julliard, head of Greenpeace France, said that the detained pair were people who drove a truck during the protest in front of the Russian embassy, and not those who "borrowed" the statue from the museum. - 'Tool to deter activists' - The activists' lawyer condemned authorities for detaining and later charging them. "I don't understand this decision to open a judicial investigation, as the Grevin Museum clearly stated that there was no damage," said Dose. "Increasingly, the justice system is becoming a tool to deter activists from exercising their freedom of expression and opinion," she added. The Grevin Museum filed a complaint on Monday but subsequently took the matter in good humour. "The figures can only be viewed on site," it said on its Instagram feed. Speaking earlier, Dose denounced the detention as "completely disproportionate", saying they had spent three nights in a cell. The lawyer condemned the "deplorable" conditions in which the two activists were being held, "attached to benches for hours and dragged from police station to police station". One activist spent the night without a blanket and was unable to lie down because her cell was too small, the lawyer said. "The other had to sleep on the floor because there were too many people in the cell," she added. The lawyer argued that "no harm resulted from the non-violent action", insisting that "all offences" ceased to exist once the statue has been returned to the museum. The activists managed to slip out through an emergency exit of the museum by posing as maintenance workers. France has been one of the most vocal supporters of Kyiv since Russia invaded Ukraine in February 2022. Macron has taken the lead in seeking to forge a coordinated European response to defending Ukraine, after US President Donald Trump shocked the world by directly negotiating with Russia. But Greenpeace and other activists say that French companies continue to do business with Moscow despite multiple rounds of sanctions slapped against Russia after the start of the invasion. © 2025 AFP
LeMonde
2 hours ago
- LeMonde
'The simultaneous rise of the far right and persistently sluggish growth in Europe is striking'
This is not a tidal wave, but rather a slow and steady advance. From south to north, far-right parties are making progress across Europe. If current trends continue, a particularly cynical statistician might hazard the following prediction: Within five to 10 years, Nigel Farage (Reform UK) will be in power in the United Kingdom, Alice Weidel (Alternative für Deutschland, AfD) in Germany and Marine Le Pen (Rassemblement National, RN) in France. A grim but unlikely trio? Not so sure. The magnitude of the phenomenon – which should preoccupy both center-right and center-left parties – demands attention. How did this happen? And why? The latest elections have been telling. In Poland, Portugal and Romania, protest-driven far-right parties have come close to first or second place. In early May, during a series of local elections in England, Reform UK dealt a defeat to Labour under Prime Minister Keir Starmer and outpaced the opposition Conservatives, the Tories, led by Kemi Badenoch. Brexit in 2016 failed to deliver on any of its promises – in fact, quite the opposite – but one of its most notorious standard-bearers, Farage, has returned to the heart of British politics. In France, the Rassemblement National is the party with the largest number of MPs in the Assemblée Nationale – and is best positioned for the first round of the 2027 French presidential election. On a national-populist, euroskeptic and Putin-friendly platform, Robert Fico once again heads the Slovak government. In Northern Europe, protest movements sometimes take part in governing coalitions. In Italy, far-right Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni has struck a shrewd balance: tough on immigration, pro-European, supportive of Ukraine and on good terms with Donald Trump. Frequent hostility toward the EU The image of a uniform rise of the far right, with the same causes and actors defending the same agenda, must be qualified. National differences matter. The cocktail of right-wing populism is mixed differently from one country to another. The sense of being outnumbered by immigrants is often assumed to be universal. Yet Romania and Slovakia, for example, suffer more from emigration than immigration.
France 24
2 hours ago
- France 24
Brazil's Lula urges Macron to seal Mercosur trade deal
France has staunchly opposed ratifying the so-called Mercosur agreement, a trade deal between the European Union and four South American nations including Brazil, over fears a flow of lower-cost agricultural goods would outcompete Europe's farmers. "Open your heart a little to this opportunity to finalise this agreement with our dear Mercosur," Lula said during a state visit to Paris. "This agreement would be the strongest response our regions could offer in the face of the uncertainty caused by the return of unilateralism and tariff protectionism," he added, referring to sweeping tariffs imposed or threatened by US President Donald Trump. Trump, who argues his tariffs will bring manufacturing jobs back to the United States, has hit the EU with multiple waves of levies. For his part, Macron reiterated his concerns about the deal's impact on French farmers, citing differences in environmental regulations between the EU and Mercosur countries. "I don't know how to explain to my farmers that, at a time when I am asking them to comply with more standards, I am opening up my market on a massive scale to people who do not comply at all," Macron said. "Because what will happen? It won't be better for the climate, but we will completely destroy our agriculture," he added. "That is why I said earlier we must improve this deal." Germany, Spain, Portugal and others have welcomed the accord with Mercosur bloc members Argentina, Brazil, Paraguay and Uruguay, but France has said from the start it is not acceptable in its current form. To be approved, the deal must receive the backing of at least 15 of the 27 EU states, representing a minimum of 65 percent of the population.
