'Nicolas' in one of the many images of him with guns. © Document Mediapart

A number of ultra-right terrorism cases in France in recent years have featured teenagers, a trend that is worrying the French authorities. In many cases youngsters are being recruited by groups from forums linked to online video games. Mediapart here reveals the case of a small ultra-right group whose 16-year-old leader and two associates were recently arrested. Sébastien Bourdon and Matthieu Suc report.

Emmanuel Macron has been re-elected as president of France. In the second and decisive round of the French presidential election that took place this Sunday, Macron beat off the challenge from his far-right rival, Marine Le Pen. Initial projections gave him a winning margin of close to 58% to around 42%. His victory – by a large margin though slimmer than his win against the same candidate in 2017 – means that the centre-right Macron becomes the first French president to win a second term since Jacques Chirac in 2002. The outcome has been greeted with relief across Europe and around the world, for a Le Pen victory would have had profound implications for France's role in both the European Union and NATO. Macron, who had been the favourite in the polls to win, will begin his second term on May 13th. Attention is already switching to the key Parliamentary elections in June which will determine the nature of Macron's new government. Find out how the election night unfolded with our live coverage of the events and reaction here. Reporting by Michael Streeter and Graham Tearse.

In the streets of Paris. © Rachida El Azzouzi / Mediapart

For more than 30 years an obsession with the wearing of the headscarf has dominated public debate in France, and this presidential campaign has been no exception. The far-right candidate Marine Le Pen has even suggested she might ban its wearing in public places if she is elected head of state this Sunday, April 24th. Here Mediapart speaks to French Muslim women at the centre of this incessant and damaging debate, to hear their point of view. Rachida El Azzouzi and Faïza Zerouala report.

An Emmanuel Macron Election poster in Paris, 2017. © Photo Arthur Nicholas Orchard / Hans Lucas via AFP

In 2017 a section of the French Left refused to vote for Emmanuel Macron in the second round against the far-right candidate Marine Le Pen because of their profound disagreement with his politics. Now, five years later, some of those same abstainers are planning to return to the voting booths for Sunday's crucial second round vote. The reason? To make sure there is no chance that Le Pen can win by default. Mathilde Goanec spoke to some of these voters who have changed their approach since 2017.

Marine Le Pen during an election campaign press conference in Vernon, Normandy, on April 12th. © Photo Thomas Samson / AFP

A report by the European Union’s anti-fraud agency OLAF, now passed on to the French public prosecution services, accuses Marine Le Pen, the far-right candidate who will face Emmanuel Macron in this month’s presidential election final round, of the fraudulent misuse of 137,000 euros of public funds she received from the European Parliament when she was an MEP, Mediapart can reveal. Other individuals close to her are also accused by OLAF of defrauding the parliament. Marine Turchi and Fabrice Arfi report.

Marine Le Pen at her April 13th press conference to present her foreign affairs and defence policies. © Photo Carine Schmitt / Hans Lucas

As far-right leader Marine Le Pen approaches what is predicted will be a tightly fought duel with Emmanuel Macron in the April 24th final round of France’s presidential elections, the credibility of her capacity to govern is under heightened scrutiny, not least over her ability to form a government. Lucie Delaporte reports.

The first round of the French presidential elections was held on Sunday, when centre-right Emmanuel Macron, seeking a second term in office, and far-right Rassemblement National party leader Marine Le Pen emerged as the highest placed out 12 candidates. They will now go on to a second and final round duel on April 24th. There were surprises in the scores of other candidates, and who their supporters decide to back, or not, in the second round will be crucial in what promises to be a tight second-round contest. Find out how the election night unfolded with our live coverage of the events here (along with the official results announced on Monday and a basic guide to how the elections work). Reporting by Graham Tearse and Michael Streeter.

MPs debating at the National Assembly, July 18th 2022. © Photo Stéphane Mouchmouche

France’s lower house, the National Assembly, on Wednesday approved a package of adjustments to the 2022 state budget, which centres on emergency measures to ease the growing cost of living crisis. But the adoption of the measures came after a tortuous series of debates for the government which, after recently losing its absolute majority in the Assembly, was forced into compromises. For opposition groups, it demonstrated a newly invigorated parliament, while for the government it confirmed the serious challenges ahead for pushing through its planned reforms. Mathieu Dejean reports.

From 2015 McKinsey provided services free of charge to Emmanuel Macron. © Sebastien Calvet / Mediapart

A report by French senators recently lambasted Emmanuel Macron's government over its awarding of contracts worth a total of up to 2.4 billion euros to outside consultancy firms, including the French arm of US firm McKinsey & Company. Now Mediapart can reveal how McKinsey pinned its hopes on Macron when he was France's economy minister, well before he announced he was standing for the presidency in 2017. The consultancy firm's strategy included providing services for the minister for free. Sarah Brethes and Antton Rouget spoke to former consultants at McKinsey who revealed the methods used to try to gain influence with the man who went on to become president of France.

Ukrainian fighters, including former members of the French Foreign Legion, pose with a French flag bearing the insignia of the 2nd Foreign Parachute Regiment based at Calvi on Corsica. © Capture d'écran Telegram

Fighters have been arriving from all corners of the planet to help defend Ukraine itself against the Russian invasion. Mediapart has been told that these foreign fighters include around 150 from France. The authorities in Paris meanwhile worry there could be a repeat of the problems seen during the Syrian war when French fighters went to combat Bashar al-Assad's regime – and came back radicalised. Sébastien Bourdon and Matthieu Suc report.

A display at Red Star's Bauer stadium at Saint-Ouen in February 2014marking the 70th anniversary of Rino Della Negra's execution. © Photo : Red Star Fans

During World War II a young man called Rino Della Negra played for the prestigious Red Star football club from Saint-Ouen in the northern suburbs of Paris. But as well as playing top-level football he was also secretly a member of a French Resistance group. Della Negra was executed on February 21st 1944 by the Nazis at the age of just 20, but later became an icon of the club's grassroots fans. Now two historians have charted the life of this young working class footballer. As Mickaël Correia reports, Della Negra was also the the son of Italian immigrants and his story makes a mockery of the hazy notion of “national identity” so beloved by the far-right today.

Radical-left LFI party MPs during the July 11th session at the National Assembly. © Photo Arthur Nicholas Orchard / Hans Lucas via AFP

French MPs gathered earlier this week to debate a censure motion against the new government tabled by the NUPES leftwing coalition. The motion was defeated, but the rowdy parliamentary session soon centred on the “Uber Files” revelations of how Emmanuel Macron, when economy and finance minister, secretly championed the US company’s project to set up business in France. As Pauline Graulle reports, the Left are determined to hold the French president to account over what one MP called “a state scandal”, and are pushing for a parliamentary committee of inquiry into the affair.

Spot the difference: campaign leaflets from Emmanuel Macron and Valérie Pécresse. © Magali Cohen / Hans Lucas / Hans Lucas via AFP

When Emmanuel Macron recently set out his manifesto for next month's presidential election he adopted both the language and the policies of the mainstream Right. As a result the official right-wing candidate, Valérie Pécresse from the Les Républicains party, has seen her own position on the political spectrum squeezed. Her supporters are now wondering how to counter Macron's occupation of the Right's political terrain – and, indeed, whether it can be countered at all. Ilyes Ramdani reports.

Last weekend marked the 60th anniversary of the Évian Accords which brought an end to the bloody Algerian War and paved the way for that country's independence from France. But for many ordinary Algerians their memory of that period is still dominated by the violence perpetrated at the time by the armed French group that was virulently opposed to granting Algeria's independence, the Organisation Armée Secrète or OAS. Nejma Brahim visited Oran on the north-west coast of Algeria where an OAS car bomb killed scores of people on February 28th 1962.

Sergei Pugachev, pictured here at his home in Nice, south-east France, in 2016. © Photo Adam Ferguson/ The New York Times / REA

Exiled Russian oligarch Sergei Pugachev, who became dubbed “the Kremlin’s banker”, was once part of Vladimir Putin’s inner circle, until he was eventually cast out by the Russian president and took refuge abroad. In this interview with Mediapart, he details how Putin and his close allies, what he calls “a junta which has captured power, all the money and all the institutions of the state”, function. He denounces a system of corruption on a vast scale, including that of foreign politicians, argues why the decision to wage war on Ukraine marks “the end of Putin’s Russia”, and describes French President Emmanuel Macron’s frequent calls to Putin as “ridiculous”.