Paris mayor dips into the Seine River to showcase its improved cleanliness before Olympic events
After months of anticipation, Paris Mayor Anne Hidalgo took a dip in the Seine River, fulfilling a promise to show the river was clean enough to host open swimming competitions during the 2024 Olympics.
French sports minister takes a dip in the Seine ahead of Paris Olympics
French sports minister Amรฉlie Oudรฉa-Castรฉra has taken a symbolic dip in the Seine in a bid to ease concerns about water quality before the start of the Paris Olympics.
The far right seemed to have a lock on France's legislative elections. Here's why it didn't win
French far-right leader Marine Le Pen appeared to be nearer to power than ever last week after her National Rally party triumphed in the opening round of legislative elections.
It's France's moment of truth. Here's how its snap elections work and what comes next
French voters face a decisive choice in the runoff Sunday of snap parliamentary elections that could produce the countryโs first far-right government since the World War II Nazi occupation.
France's waning influence in coup-hit Africa appears clear while few remember their former colonizer
The era of Franceโs arm-twisting interventionism in Africa may finally be over.
French general overseeing restoration of Notre Dame Cathedral, Jean-Louis Georgelin, dies at 74
The decorated French general in charge of the ambitious, big-budget restoration of fire-ravaged Notre Dame Cathedral in Paris has died.
The mercenary chief who urged an uprising against Russia's generals has long ties to Putin
Mercenary chief Yevgeny Prigozhin has taken the spotlight in Russia by posing a direct challenge to Russiaโs generals over the war in Ukraine.
Domestic unrest interrupts Macron's European future speech
French President Emmanuel Macron has laid out his vision of a bold, assertive European future, but not before simmering anger at his domestic pension reforms boiled over once more as he began his speech in the Netherlands.
Why France's parliamentary elections are important to Macron
Emmanuel Macron saw off the far rightโs Marine Le Pen in Aprilโs presidential election, but now the French president is facing a threat from the other end of the political spectrum in the fight for parliamentary power.
Love thy enemy: Critics key for Macron in France's election
Disgruntled left-wing voters whose candidates were knocked out in the first round of France's election are the wild cards in the winner-takes-all runoff on Sunday.
France's Sarkozy convicted of corruption, sentenced to jail
The verdict is expected in a landmark corruption and influence-peddling trial that has put French former President Nicolas Sarkozy at risk of a prison sentence if he is convicted. (AP Photo/Michel Euler)PARIS โ A Paris court found French former President Nicolas Sarkozy guilty of corruption and influence peddling on Monday and sentenced him to a year in prison. The ruling marks the first time in Franceโs modern history that a former president has been convicted of corruption โ and given a prison term. The court found that Sarkozy and his co-defendants sealed a โpact of corruption,โ based on โconsistent and serious evidenceโ. AdIn one phone call with Herzog, Sarkozy said of Azibert: โIโll make him move up.
Ex-French leader Valery Giscard d'Estaing dies at age 94
FILE - In this Aug.9 1969, Valery Giscard d'Estaing, left, as Finance Minister and Jacques Chirac as Secretary of State to Finance leave Elysee Palace, Aug. 9, 1969. (AP Photo, File)PARIS โ Valery Giscard dโEstaing, the president of France from 1974 to 1981 who became a champion of European integration, died on Wednesday. Giscard dโEstaing was hospitalized last month with heart problems, but remained vigorous deep into old age. Young Giscard dโEstaing studied at the prestigious Polytechnical Institute and then the elite National School of Administration, before mastering economics at Oxford. Giscard d'Estaing โmade France be proud," he said.
French ex-President Sarkozy stands trial for corruption
Sarkozy is being accused of having tried to illegally obtain information from a magistrate about an investigation involving him in 2014. He stands trial in a Paris court along with his lawyer Thierry Herzog, 65, and the magistrate, Gilbert Azibert, 73. They face a prison sentence of up to 10 years and a maximum fine of 1 million euros ($1.2 million). Sarkozy and Herzog explained that they bought the phones to avoid being targeted by illegal phone tapping. Sarkozy was handled preliminary charges including โillegal campaign financingโ in the Libyan investigation, which has been underway since 2013 โ and prompted the wiretapping of his phones.
'It belongs to us!": Tense French trial over colonial art
That's the question a French court weighed Wednesday in an emotionally charged trial centered around a Congolese activist campaigning to take back art he says was plundered by colonizers. However, the lawyer for the French state did not ask for prison time, demanding only modest fines. He choked up when talking about the skulls of Algerian 19th century resistance fighters long held as trophies in a French museum and returned to his native Algeria this year. A 2018 study commissioned by Macron recommended that French museums give back works that were taken without consent, if African countries request them. So far, France is preparing to give back 26 works of African art โ out of some 90,000 works believed held in French museums, most in the Quai Branly.
French ex-prime minister found guilty of fraud
PARIS A Paris court has found French former prime minister Francois Fillon guilty of having used public funds to pay his wife and children for work they never performed. The work had brought the family more than 1 million euros ($1.08 million) since 1998. Fillon, who was Frances prime minister from 2007 to 2012, then left French politics. A Paris court is set to give or may postpone a verdict in the fraud trial of former French Prime Minister Francois Fillon on Monday. Fillon, once the youngest lawmaker at the National Assembly at the age of 27, served as prime minister under President Nicolas Sarkozy from 2007 to 2012.