How Covid invited a rethink of the scientific publications business

 © Photo illustration Mediapart © Photo illustration Mediapart

Science journalists have for many years cited the difficulty of conciliating the (long) time required in scientific activity and the (rapid) time in which the media operate. The Covid-19 pandemic came perilously close to joining the two, when an avalanche of scientific papers about the virus were published with such haste that many had to be swiftly retracted. Science journalist and historian Nicolas Chevassus-au-Louis reports on how the pandemic exposed the unvirtuous practices of the lucrative scientific publications business, now brought to a turning point and in need of reinvention.

Summer reads: the Portuguese who chose exile over Salazar’s colonial war

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A group of Portuguese army officers head for exile across the border with Spain, August 23rd 1970. © Fernando Mariano Cardeira A group of Portuguese army officers head for exile across the border with Spain, August 23rd 1970. © Fernando Mariano Cardeira

Between 1961 and 1974, an estimated 200,000 young Portuguese fled abroad to escape their call-up to fight in their country’s bloody colonial war in Africa, while around 8,000 serving soldiers, according to some historians, deserted. As part of a summer series in which Mediapart journalists highlight those books published in France over the last 12 months which have particularly caught their eye, Mickaël Correia presents Exils, a compilation of first-hand accounts of draft evaders and deserters who defied Portugal’s dictator António de Oliveira Salazar, and who by doing so were forced into a clandestine and precarious existence far from home.

Paris 2024 Summer Olympics: victory for tropical wood lobby

Building work on the Paris 2024 Summer Olympics athletes’ village. © Photo Arnaud Paillard / Hans Lucas via AFP Building work on the Paris 2024 Summer Olympics athletes’ village. © Photo Arnaud Paillard / Hans Lucas via AFP

In 2024, Paris will host the Summer Olympics, and the organisers have pledged the games will be “climate positive” because more carbon emissions will be offset than created, while the “environmental excellence” criteria banned the use of tropical timber in the building of the athletes’ village. But, as Jade Lindgaard reports, the tropical timber industry has, after an intensive campaign, now claimed victory.

The perilous state of French utility giant EDF

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Outgoing EDF chairman and CEO Jean-Bernard Lévy. © FRANCOIS NASCIMBENI / AFP Outgoing EDF chairman and CEO Jean-Bernard Lévy. © FRANCOIS NASCIMBENI / AFP

Last month, the French government announced it will re-nationalise utility giant EDF which, also last month, has reported historic first-half losses in 2022 of 5.3 billion euros. EDF’s financial woes are exacerbated by the unprecedented shut-downs due to repairs and maintenance of more than half its fleet of 56 nuclear reactors, and the government’s cap on electricity price rises. Martine Orange reports on the background to what is the most perilous situation the company has known in its 76 years of existence.

Macron’s rehabilitation of the “murderous prince”

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Emmanuel Macron welcoming Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman at the Élysée Palace, July 28th 2022. © BERTRAND GUAY / AFP Emmanuel Macron welcoming Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman at the Élysée Palace, July 28th 2022. © BERTRAND GUAY / AFP

Saudi Arabia's Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman visited Paris on Thursday for talks with President Emmanuel Macron who later hosted him for dinner at the Élysée Palace, amid outrage from rights activists. In exchange for staging the prince’s comeback on the international diplomatic scene, four years after the murder of Saudi journalist and dissident Jamal Khashoggi, Macron was hoping to obtain a substantial rise in Saudi oil production. But, as René Backmann writes in this analysis of Macron’s dealings with “MBS”, the move may well prove to benefit only he who Amnesty International secretary general Agnès Callamard has dubbed “the murderous prince”.   

Why French ministers prefer criminalising green protests to tackling the climate crisis

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A banner against the planned irrigation reservoir at the Sainte-Soliine site on October 30th 2022. © Pascal Lachenaud / AFP A banner against the planned irrigation reservoir at the Sainte-Soliine site on October 30th 2022. © Pascal Lachenaud / AFP

After environmentalists protested over plans by farmers in western France to build a large irrigation reservoir, interior minister Gérald Darmanin likened some of the demonstrators to “ecoterrorists”. In doing so, say Mathieu Dejean and Fabien Escalona in this op-ed article, the minister was spouting paranoid fantasies while ignoring warnings about whether the planet can remain habitable. At the same time, they write, the country's main green party – which should be setting the political agenda - remains bogged down in internal squabbles.

Operation Fake Info: firm used by French business elites suspected of infiltrating Wikipedia

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 © Illustration Justine Vernier / Mediapart © Illustration Justine Vernier / Mediapart

Mediapart has already revealed how a French firm that works for foreign directorships and the bosses of some of the biggest business groups in France, including billionaire Bernard Arnault, has been accused of manipulating information through various blogs, including on our own site. Today that same company, Avisa Partners, is suspected of having modified pages on the online encyclopedia Wikipedia on behalf of its powerful clients. Fabrice Arfi and Antton Rouget report.

How 'green concrete' has failed to build an eco-revolution in France and the world

By Floriane Louison
A Lafarge site in Paris, February 22nd 2022. © Photo Magali Cohen / Hans Lucas via AFP A Lafarge site in Paris, February 22nd 2022. © Photo Magali Cohen / Hans Lucas via AFP

Concrete is the second most consumed product on the planet after water and its environmental impact is huge. As the climate crisis unfolds, major companies in the sector in France and around the world have made repeated promises that they will achieve carbon neutrality. But as Floriane Louison reports, so far this 'greenwashing' has produced very few effective solutions.

The forgotten lessons of Chicago's deadly 1995 heatwave

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Morgue staff transferring the body of a victim of the Chicago heatwave in July 1995. © Photo Ogrocki / Sipa. Morgue staff transferring the body of a victim of the Chicago heatwave in July 1995. © Photo Ogrocki / Sipa.

A detailed “social autopsy” by sociologist Eric Klinenberg examined the heatwave that killed more than 700 people in the American city during one week in July 1995. According to the American academic it was the existence of strong social ties and urban vibrancy that helped stop more people from dying, and not free phone helplines such as the French authorities are issuing to help people in the heatwave currently suffocating France and other parts of Europe. Mediapart's environment correspondent Jade Lindgaard reports on the lessons for the rest of the world from Chicago's devastating heatwave 27 years ago.

Macron, Google and Amazon: the documents the Élysée wanted to stay secret

By Alexandre Léchenet
Emmanuel Macron with the operations director of Amazon in France, Ronan Bolé, right, during a visit to the Amazon warehouse at Boves close to Amiens in northern France, October 3rd 2017. © Photo Yoan Valat / Pool / AFP Emmanuel Macron with the operations director of Amazon in France, Ronan Bolé, right, during a visit to the Amazon warehouse at Boves close to Amiens in northern France, October 3rd 2017. © Photo Yoan Valat / Pool / AFP

The Élysée cited business confidentiality when it refused to provide Mediapart with correspondence between presidential advisors and Amazon, Google and others giants of the digital world dating from 2017. However, Mediapart pursued the matter and after a lengthy process the administrative court in Paris found in our favour and we now have access to these documents. Like the recent 'Uber Files' controversy, they show just how closely aligned the thinking and approach of these technological groups is with that of Macron and his entourage. And also like the Uber case, they reveal that a business lobbyist from one of the groups – in this case  Amazon - took part in Emmanuel Macron's 2017 presidential campaign. Alexandre Léchenet reports.

Displaced: Maasai community forced to move as UAE elite use Tanzanian land for safaris

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A demonstration in Nairobi, Kenya, on June 17th 2022, against the enforced eviction of the Maasai people in neighbouring Tanzania. © Photo Tony Karumba/AFP A demonstration in Nairobi, Kenya, on June 17th 2022, against the enforced eviction of the Maasai people in neighbouring Tanzania. © Photo Tony Karumba/AFP

In early June around 30 indigenous Maasai people in the north-east of Tanzania were injured as they protested against being forcibly displaced from their ancestral lands. The authorities say the move is necessary to protect the area's extraordinary landscape and wildlife. But as Michael Pauron reports, lurking in the background to this affair are the interests of a private hunting company that has close ties to the royal family in Dubai. 

Mystery of vanishing emails as top Macron aide faces ongoing 'conflict of interest' probe

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 © Illustration Simon Toupet / Mediapart avec Ludovic Marin / AFP © Illustration Simon Toupet / Mediapart avec Ludovic Marin / AFP

President Emmanuel Macron's key aide in the Élysée, his chief of staff Alexis Kohler, has faced two investigations into an alleged unlawful acquisition of an interest and “influence peddling” over his family links with major shipping line MSC. The first was dropped back in 2018 but another was launched in 2020 and is still ongoing. The current investigation has unearthed some troubling documents for Alexis Kohler, whose official title is secretary-general of the Élysée. Not only do they show him to have been far more involved than thought with issues involving MSC while working as a civil servant, some potentially important documents and emails have also vanished from certain locations - though they have been retrieved elsewhere – in what appears to have been an attempt to remove the paper trail of his interventions. Martine Orange reports on the continuing investigation into President Macron's right-hand man.

Judge reopens probe into France's role in Rwandan massacre

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The Bisesero memorial in Rwanda, 2010. © Béatrice Mollaret / Photononstop via AFP The Bisesero memorial in Rwanda, 2010. © Béatrice Mollaret / Photononstop via AFP

A French judge has unexpectedly decided to reopen an investigation into the massacre at Bisesero in Rwanda in June 1994 and the actions of the French military in relation to it. This bloody event, part of the Hutu genocide against the Tutsi people, is seen as one of the most embarrassing episodes for France during the entire genocide. The investigating judge is reopening the case following an independent commission's report on the Rwandan genocide that was delivered to President Emmanuel Macron in March 2021. That commission, led by historian Vincent Duclert, said France bore “serious and overwhelming responsibilities” for events in Rwanda. Fabrice Arfi reports.

French state sentenced over attempt to search Mediapart's offices

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On July 6th, a French court ruled against the state over its attempted search of Mediapart’s premises on February 4th 2019, which it found was “neither necessary in a democratic society, nor proportionate to the objective sought”. The ruling, which was notably severe for the Paris public prosecution services, further enshrines the freedom to inform and the protection of sources, writes Mediapart’s publishing editor Edwy Plenel in this analysis of the case.

Macron’s new government: more of the same from a president in denial

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French President Emmanuel Macron and Prime Minister Élisabeth Borne at the Élysée Palace, May 23rd 2022. © Photo Eliot Blondet / Abaca French President Emmanuel Macron and Prime Minister Élisabeth Borne at the Élysée Palace, May 23rd 2022. © Photo Eliot Blondet / Abaca

A new French government was announced on Monday, replacing the smaller interim government formed following Emmanuel Macron’s re-election as president in April. It also follows the stinging losses of Macron’s centre-right party in June’s legislative elections, after which the president pledged to honour what he called “the will for change that the country has clearly expressed”. But instead, writes Ilyes Ramdani in this presentation and analysis of the new government, the 41-strong ministerial line-up is simply a larger helping of more of the same.