On January 7th 2015, a terrorist attack on the offices of the satirical magazine Charlie Hebdo in Paris murdered 12 people, including its editor Stéphane Charbonnier. The weekly publication's legal affairs writer Sigolène Vinson was in the office during the bloody attack by brothers Chérif and Saïd Kouachi but her life was spared. Ten years and three trials later, she tells Mediapart's Matthieu Suc that what helps heal her is “sunshine, sea and silence”.

On January 6th Nicolas Sarkozy took centre stage at an historic trial in Paris. He and three former ministers face charges over claims that the former president's successful 2007 election campaign was part-funded by the Libyan regime of Colonel Muammar Gaddafi. And that the North African country – whose leader was one of the most notorious dictators on the planet – received favours in exchange. The marathon trial, unprecedented in both the nature of the charges and the profiles of the defendants, who number 13 in all, is expected to last until April 10th. It marks the culmination of a ten-year judicial investigation that, in the words of the judges carrying out the probe, has “revealed both payments and reciprocal benefits”. Fabrice Arfi and Karl Laske report on the background to this momentous court case.

Nicolas Sarkozy and some of his former ministers go on trial this Monday over claims that the former French president's successful 2007 election campaign was funded by the Libyan regime of Colonel Muammar Gaddafi. In this, as in other criminal cases in which the former head of state has been implicated, his approach has been to disclaim any personal knowledge of events, even to the point of throwing his closest associates under the bus. In the current case the ex-head of state has had harsh words for his most loyal lieutenants, Brice Hortefeux and Claude Guéant. “I had no way of knowing what the reality of their lives was,” he told judges investigating the affair. Fabrice Arfi and Karl Laske report.

In May 2024 graffiti appeared on the walls of the Holocaust museum in Paris. The 35 spray-painted red hand symbols were quickly condemned by politicians as an act of anti-Semitism. But who was responsible? After a swift investigation, detectives tracked down those responsible for defacing the Mémorial de la Shoah. Matthieu Suc reports on how investigators then quickly discovered that the vandalism was in fact part of a wider Russian attempt to destabilise France.

The French overseas territory of New Caledonia, situated in the south-west of the Pacific Ocean, was last year plunged into chaos over a move by Paris to introduce an electoral reform that weakened the political clout of parties of the indigenous, and largely pro-independence, Kanak population. Violent protests over the reform erupted last May, after which at least 14 people died in the clashes, which also left the archipelago’s economy reeling. Mediapart's Ellen Salvi returned to New Caledonia at the end of 2024 where she met with the Kanak population in Saint-Louis, a hotbed of the insurrection and subsequently the target of a repressive crackdown. She reports here on how the inhabitants, despite their anger, sadness and fatigue, remain determined to pursue the Kanak cause for independence.

Former French president Nicolas Sarkozy and three of his ex-ministers will stand trial in Paris on January 6th on corruption charges related to the alleged illegal funding of his 2007 election campaign by the regime of Libyan dictator Muammar Gaddafi. Part of the prosecution case is the alleged offer by Sarkozy’s entourage to overturn, in return for the funding, an international arrest warrant issued by France against Gaddafi’s brother-in-law Abdullah al-Senussi, who was found guilty in absentia of masterminding the mid-air bombing of a French airliner in which 170 people died. In this interview with Mediapart, the sister of one of the victims, and the daughter of another, recount their long quest for justice, and explain why they hope the trial will finally present the truth about the suspected ugly dealings over Senussi.

One year ago, US investment firm Cerberus Capital Management bought the French arm of British banking group HSBC for the symbolic sum of 1 euro. After pledging no job losses over its first 12 months of ownership, when the bank was given back its former name of CCF, the management has now announced a plan to axe 1,410 jobs and to close 85 of its 235 branches nationwide. The move represents the largest single redundancy plan currently underway in France. Khedidja Zerouali reports.

President Emmanuel Macron’s brief visit to France’s Indian Ocean territory Mayotte this week was marked by heated exchanges with local residents who are angry at the struggling authorities’ inability to provide adequate water and food supplies almost one week after Cyclone Chido flattened most of the archipelago. While the official death toll stands at 31, there is rising concern over the fate of inhabitants, mostly illegal immigrants, of the numerous shantytowns on the territory, where few searches have yet been carried out. Jéromine Doux reports from Mayotte.

Nicolas Sarkozy on Wednesday lost his ultimate appeal against his conviction in 2021 for “active corruption” and “influence peddling”. France’s highest appeal court also upheld the sentence he was handed of three years in prison, two of them suspended, and a three-year ban on holding public office and voting. Sarkozy, 69, will serve his prison sentence at home wearing and electronic tag. Michel Deléan reports.

With Donald Trump’s re-election to the White House, billionaire Elon Musk’s social media platform X, the former Twitter, has become transformed into a weapon of mass disinformation. Mediapart refuses to serve the cause of the enemies of journalism and the public general interest, explains publishing editor Carine Fouteau.